


violence in the pouring rain

by KaytiKazoo



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern: Still Have Powers, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon-Typical Violence, Demisexual Leo Fitz, Developing Friendships, Developing Relationship, Explicit Sexual Content, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Torture, Leo Fitz & Skye | Daisy Johnson Friendship, Leo Fitz Has Powers, M/M, Team Bonding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-10
Updated: 2020-12-11
Packaged: 2021-03-08 04:07:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 54,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26939356
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KaytiKazoo/pseuds/KaytiKazoo
Summary: After joining Phil Coulson's newly formed team of Manifested-Handler bonded pairs, Leo Fitz has to navigate using his powers openly for the first time, the dangers of being a field agent, and his blossoming new relationship with Lance Hunter, and all of the difficulties that come with this new change.
Relationships: Bobbi Morse/Jemma Simmons/Skye | Daisy Johnson, Leo Fitz & Skye | Daisy Johnson, Leo Fitz/Lance Hunter
Comments: 12
Kudos: 15





	1. Chapter 1

I've got friends that will run through walls   
I've got friends that will fly once called   
When I've nowhere left to go   
And I need my heroes   
I've got friends that will run through walls

- _Run Through Walls by The Script_

Leo Fitz had never been what you would call  _ desired _ or chosen, so when Phil Coulson approached him and Jemma about joining his team, he was apprehensive at first. Simmons, of course, was entirely on board without question. Even though it had been Phil Coulson who had selected Fitz for training with SHIELD, even though he’d always been supportive of Fitz’s exploration and development of his powers, even though Phil Coulson had been more of a father to him than his father ever had been, despite all of that, he was still wary of the offer.

But he’d follow Jemma Simmons anywhere, bonded or no, and she leapt without looking into the field, pent up in the  lab with Fitz for over a decade. 

Fitz trusted Simmons in a way that he’d never felt with anyone else, not that he’d had many people in his life. Living in an institution for  six years would do that to you, he supposed, but at least he had Simmons now.

“Welcome!” Coulson called, as Fitz followed Simmons off of the plane that had brought them to the base. He’d spent the plane ride anxious and had noted several modifications he could make from where he sat, writing them down in his notebook in case he ever got the chance to get his hands on one. “Everyone’s here now! If you will, please join us in the conference room while your bags are brought to your rooms in the meantime.”

“Are you sure about this?” Fitz asked Simmons.

“Come on, it’ll be okay,” she said. “We’ve been training for this for years. Time to test that training.”

He groaned quietly but kept following.

“Good to have you on board,” Coulson said as they approached.

“Thanks for inviting us,” Simmons answered.

“With your test scores as well as Fitz’s abilities, it was a no brainer that you be a part of this team,” Coulson said.

Of course, Fitz thought bitterly for a moment, it was always his abilities that interested people. There weren’t many people with multiple Manifested powers, let alone twelve separate powers.

“This way,” Coulson said, and led them from the docking bay into the base, a twisting maze of identical halls. “So, this is the Lighthouse, a secret base built in the 50s and hidden from everyone except for the Director, and now you. Director Fury granted us permission to use this base to train and use as our operations center. It’s fully equipped with training rooms which I was hoping you’d be willing to reinforce, Fitz.”

“Of course!” Fitz replied, glad that his engineering as going to be put to use for once.

“We’ll have a demonstration of everyone’s powers so you can see what you’re working with. And everyone will see what the team as a whole can do.”

“Does that include me?” Fitz asked.

“Yes.”

“All of them?”

“Whatever you’re comfortable with,” Coulson replied.

There were some powers that he and Simmons didn’t touch, even in isolation, even in the most secure room in the world.

“Right in here,” Coulson said, “if you will.”

He opened a door noted Conference A and when they stepped in, they were met by seven stares, each obviously paired except for Melinda May who stood at the other end of the conference room unfazed. May had helped Coulson find and rescue Fitz from the institution, and had handpicked Jemma Simmons to be his Handler, so he nodded at her, and she nodded back.

“Okay, take a seat, Fitzsimmons,” Coulson said, slipping back into their Academy nickname. “Thank you all for coming. This new initiative is designed to utilize your gifts to help locate and protect  unbonded Manifested. Each of you brings something unique to the team, and that goes beyond just those with abilities.”

Fitz shifted awkwardly in his seat, overly sensitive to everyone’s emotions, ranging from boredom to anxiety to confidence. Simmons reached for his hand and projected her easy, sweet calm over him.

“Thanks,” he muttered.

“Just remember to tune it out. Hum in the background.”

He sighed  but nodded,  and pushed the babble of their emotions into the back of his mind. 

“So, let me introduce everyone. Everyone knows May. Over here, we have Grant Ward and – what do you want to go by?”

“Daisy,” she replied. “Johnson.”

“Grant Ward and Daisy Johnson. Then we have Alphonso Mackenzie -”

“Just Mack is fine.”

“And Elena Rodriguez.”

“You can call me Yo-Yo.”

“Next, Barbara Morse – she goes by Bobbi – and Lance Hunter.”

"Just Hunter for me," he said. 

Fitz tracked each person, but his eyes lingered on Lance Hunter, his emotions somehow brighter, more vibrant that everyone else’s, a halo of intoxicating curiosity and below that, a smudge of wariness that Fitz felt echoed in himself. Beyond that, Hunter was gorgeous, which Fitz had to tuck away to unpack later. 

“And of course, Fitzsimmons.”

Fitz and Simmons, in sync since they were sixteen, waved but didn’t correct him.

“Wait,” Daisy said before Coulson could continue. “Which one is Fitzsimmons?”

“I’m Fitz,” he offered. 

“Simmons,” Simmons said, grinned.

“Oh, right. Leopold Fitz and Jemma Simmons,” Coulson amended. “Our final bonded pair.”

“We’re all bonded pairs?” Yo-Yo asked, looking around at everyone, eyes doubtful as she looked at Fitz and Simmons. “Everyone?”

“Yes, everyone. Even I am part of a bonded pair,” Coulson said, gesturing towards May, his Manifested partner. “I wanted this team to be sympathetic of what the  unbonded are going through.”

“And Handlers, in turn, have been trained to calm down and subdue powers, even before the bonding process,” May finished.

“So, because I want everyone to become extremely familiar with each other and your abilities, and to allow Fitz to start creating a safer, sturdier training studio,” Coulson said, “we’re going to have a demonstration.”

“Here?” Daisy asked.

“No,” Coulson answered and reached over to a panel on the wall nearby. He pressed a button, and the wall slid out to reveal an observation window that overlooked a training gym, fully equipped with dummies and targets. “There.”

Fitz immediately rose to inspect it, circling the table to look out the observation window. He pulled a notebook from his back pocket, and started sketching out his improvements, shorthand notes in the corner. 

“Oh, those corners would definitely need some reinforcements,” Simmons said following. “Maybe some dampeners. Definitely force dampeners. Shock absorption.”

“Upgrade the fire suppression system,” Fitz replied. 

“Daisy and Ward, you’re first up.”

They stood and left through the door directly into the training room. Coulson touched another button on the panel and the communication system crackled to life overhead.

“Try not to destroy anything,” Coulson requested.

Fitz could see the way Daisy rolled her eyes at him as she turned to settle with her back facing them, Ward standing a few feet away from her.

“Hit me with what you got, Daisy,” Ward said.

“All of it?”

“Preferably,” Fitz answered before anyone could. “I can’t build proper defenses if I don’t know the extent of your abilities.”

“Just avoid hitting the walls, please ,” Coulson added.

“I’ll try. I was a late bloomer,” she replied, and lifted her hands. Everyone joined them at the window, intrigued at what she was about to do. Fitz felt their excitement like a buzz of electricity across his skin. He took Simmons’ hand again to ground himself.

“They’re so loud,” he said under his breath.

“Probably because they’re new to you. Crowds are always the most overwhelming , right? Just focus on the designs , on the creating.”

Daisy let a burst of energy go from each hand, sending  visible  waves through the air that impacted Ward right in the chest bodily and sent him flying backwards, crashing into a training dummy against the far wall. 

“Padding,” Fitz and Simmons said simultaneously. 

“Holy shit,” someone whispered, and a wave of awe flooded through Fitz. 

“Thank you, Daisy, Ward,” Coulson said as Daisy crossed the room to pull Ward up off the ground.  He stood without a problem, their bond keeping him unharmed despite the impact.  “Yo-Yo and Mack, you are up next.”

Yo-Yo and Mack replaced Daisy and Ward in the training room. Mack grabbed an object from the side table that Coulson and May must have set up, a wooden staff that he held out in front of him. 

“Come and get it,” he said to Yo-Yo. 

Fitz couldn’t see Yo-Yo's face, but there was an attitude to the way she held herself that he could see, taking his challenge to heart. 

Then, in a blink of an eye, Mack was flying backwards and Yo-Yo had the staff in her hands, standing in the same place she’d been before.

“What just happened?” Hunter asked. 

“Yo-Yo has superhuman speed, but can only go as far as a single heartbeat takes, at which point she returns to her original position,” Coulson said as Mack landed on the ground with a large thud. “Like, if you’ll believe, a yo-yo.”

“The shove was unnecessary,” Mack said, pushing himself back up.

“Oh, did I hurt you,  niño ?” Yo-Yo asked, teasing.

“Flair for the dramatic,” Mack commented with a roll of his shoulders. 

“Thank you. Bobbi, Hunter, you’re up.”

Fitz watched Hunter move, following Bobbi, who was equally gorgeous but kept her emotions in check in a way that surprised Fitz and delighted him. For once, someone wasn’t shouting at him. 

“Okay, Bob,” Hunter said, and Fitz found himself leaning towards them. “Lady’s choice.”

“I have an idea,” Bobbi replied. “One moment, please.”

She cracked her neck, and rolled her shoulders. There was a ripple and her body changed. She shrunk, her tall frame becoming smaller, slighter. Her hair darkened, and in Bobbi’s place, Melinda May stood. There was a quiet moment in the conference room filled with awe and confusion. 

“Let’s see what you can do.”

Bobbi launched herself at Hunter, fast and agile, to a degree that Fitz could see was not natural. He could see the moments skipped, her speed incredible and her movements so fluid.

“Oh,” Fitz said. “That’s interesting.”

“What?” Simmons asked.

“You don’t see that?”

“No. What do you see?”

“She’s teleporting the tiniest bit, skipping motions as she goes. It’s beautiful, actually.”

“You can see that?” Daisy asked, leaning into Fitz’s space unabashedly.

“Yeah, can’t you?”

“No!”

Fitz shrugged, and watched as Hunter and Bobbi sparred, as Bobbi solidly kicked Hunter’s ass. He held his own, his own movements skilled and confident, but it didn’t take her long to lay him out, her knee in the center of his chest, holding him to the ground. 

“Good job,” Bobbi said, patting Hunter’s cheek as she stood, and her figure shifted back into Tall, Blonde, Gorgeous Bobbi Morse. “You’re getting better.”

“Fuck off,” he said but took her hand to let her hoist him up off his back. There was a quiet moment as they headed back into the conference room. 

“Okay, Fitzsimmons, your turn.”

Fitz set down his notebook on the table and followed Simmons into the room. He’d only performed his abilities for assessment before, never shown off like this.

“Just what you’re comfortable with, Fitz,” Coulson said gently. “For now until you’ve reinforced everything , at least.”

“Fitz?” he heard Daisy say. “Fitz is the Manifested?”

“Do I not seem like the type?” Fitz asked, looking over his shoulder at her.

“Not  really .”

“Where do you want to start, Simmons?” he said.

“Let’s start small, with number one.” Fitz dropped his hand to his side, and let it fill with a dancing ball of fire. “Right here, Fitz.”

She held out her hands like a catcher’s mitt and he threw the ball of flame hard and fast at her. It hit her hands and fizzled out, their bond protecting her. 

“Nice!” she said with a grin. “Good throw. Now, let’s go a little bigger. Number three, please, into number seven.”

Fitz let himself disappear, feeling the way his ability mirrored his environment. There was a quiet gasp from the conference room.

“Fitz, can you hear me?” Simmons asked.

“Fitz, can you hear me?” Fitz mimicked, Simmons’ voice coming from his mouth instead of his own.

“I do not sound like that,” she said, but he could tell she wasn’t upset.

“We’ve been friends since we were sixteen, I know what you sound like,” he said, still mimicking her.

“And drop,” she said.

He let go of both powers, becoming visible again.

“Beautiful, good job.”

Simmons had always been heavy on praise ever since they’d paired together, especially given Fitz’s relationship and history with his powers.

“One last demonstration, but we’ll need everyone to come down here to experience it,” Simmons said. “Eight, Fitz?”

“Do you have a particular idea in mind?”

“Show them when we met? Let them get to know us a bit ?”

The team came into the room, leaving May and Coulson in the conference room.

“Are you sure?” he asked

“Only if you are.”

He nodded at her, drawing himself back to that memory to memorize it again.

“Please gather,” Simmons said. “So, Fitz is going to take us on a little trip. Just don’t panic , okay?”

She looked at him and nodded.

“Take us away.”

He closed his eyes and pulled at the netting around his ability and formed it into the scene he wanted. When he opened his eyes, he could see the layer of his creation over reality. His memory of the institution spread out around them, the stark walls devoid of color or personality, cold and lonely, Fitz sitting on his bed, staring at the blank wall across from him. He was young, only sixteen, wearing the institution-provided sweatpants and t-shirt, both grey and too big on him. He looked miserable, and Fitz could still remember exactly what that misery felt like, thick and suffocating.

“Leopold Fitz,” an orderly growled, the door opening to reveal one of Fitz’s least favorite workers, and behind him was a man and a woman dressed in identical neat suits. “You have visitors.”

The orderly let them through and then closed the door, locking the visitors, a younger Phil Coulson and Melinda May, in with him.

“Are you the new shrinks?” Fitz asked, tired and bored already. 

He didn’t like new people, new people made him uncomfortable, made his skin itch and tingle in ways he wasn’t familiar with. New people and his reaction to them weren’t something he could control, and he desperately needed control over something.

“No, Mr. Fitz, we’re not shrinks. My name is Agent Coulson, this is my partner Agent May. We’re here as an outreach program from SHIELD, looking for wrongly institutionalized individuals with Manifested abilities. We’re here to help,” Coulson said.

“Help? I can’t even control myself in here.  How is taking me out of here and putting me with the general populace going to help me?”

“There’s been a discovery recently that Handlers are extremely helpful in quelling powers and reining in those out of control urges you might have. Take May for example, she’s a Manifested individual who I have bonded with and we work together with her powers to keep kids like you safe.”

“There’s no one who can keep my powers in check,” Fitz said, sinking back down into the bed, defeated.

“Let me introduce you to someone before you give up,” Coulson said.  He leaned back and tapped on the door, calling out, “Miss Simmons?”

The door opened again and a girl, sixteen with her long brown hair up in a ponytail, stepped in, wearing jeans and a sweatshirt. She was nervous, Fitz felt that coming off of her in strong waves, but below that was the soft desire to help and when they met eyes, she smiled at him.

“Hi,” she said, and her English accent was crisp compared to the harsh American accents he’d heard for six years. “I’m Jemma.”

She stuck out her hand for him to take.

“Leo,” he replied, and slowly offered his own hand. Most new people caused Power One to flare and he ended up burning people. When his hand closed over Jemma’s, he wasn’t afraid because she wasn’t. She was nervous because she was meeting someone new, just like he was, but she wasn’t afraid of him. 

“It’s nice to meet you, Leo Fitz,” she said. 

Her sincerity was a balm on his aching soul. 

“It’s so nice to meet you, Jemma Simmons.”

Fitz let the hallucination drop, leaving the team blinking in the middle of the training room. He felt the rest of his energy drain out of him and he reached for Simmons who slipped her arm around his waist and kissed his forehead sweetly to check his temperature. He hadn’t ever done a simultaneous hallucination for that many people before, and it unsurprisingly was too much too fast. 

“That was so good, Fitz. You’re getting better at that.”

“How many abilities do you have?” Mack asked, as Simmons helped him down onto a bench nearby. 

“Right now? Twelve,” he answered. 

“Twelve,” three or four people repeated.

“We demonstrated four of the twelve abilities,” Simmons said. “Number one is fire manipulation. Fitz can create and control flames. Number three is simple invisibility, number seven is vocal manipulation and mimicry. Any sound or voice Fitz hears he is able to mimic. And lastly, what you just experienced, my favorite, personally, number eight is a bit like hallucination manipulation. It’s a form of telepathy where Fitz can project an image or series of images into your mind and convince you that you are there in the place he says you are. What he showed you was the institution Coulson, May, and I released him from and the exact moment we met when we were sixteen.”

“Can you do that for any place?” Daisy asked.

“Yes and no, it’s easier and more vivid if it’s a memory,” he said, steadying himself. He felt hot all over. “So, I intimately know the institution, and can convince anyone they’re there without trying. It gets a little harder when I have to guess on some details.”

“What was that place?” Hunter asked.

“That was the institution,” Fitz replied. “When I Manifested the first time at ten, my dad had  me carted off to the only place that would take me, an asylum in America that kept Manifested like lab rats, testing out different dampeners and sedatives on us to see what worked against our powers . It’s owned and run by Hydra Technologies .”

There was an uncomfortable silence that fell over them.

“By the time I was sixteen, I had Manifested eight different powers, including the hallucination telepathy you just experienced. Since, I’ve Manifested four more.”

“What level are you assessed at?” Bobbi asked, leaning towards him. He looked up at Coulson for permission, who nodded back at him.

“Eleven,” he said, turning back to the group. 

“That’s not possible,” Ward said. “The scale only goes up to ten.”

“There’s a couple level eleven individuals in the system,” May said from the conference, “but they’re extremely well-hidden and are known only to the highest level agents. Fitz officially is a level four, assessed while at the institution. But we reassessed him at age eighteen, which is the proper age for assessment, and discovered his true level.”

“What’s everyone else assessed at?” Simmons asked, diverting the conversation away from Fitz blessedly.

“Level five,” Daisy said.

“Same, level five,” Yo-Yo said. 

“Level seven,” Bobbi replied.

“Interesting,” Simmons said, looking over their teammates and then to Fitz. “Oh, you need to rest.”

“Yeah.”

He could feel the begging burble in the back of his throat like bile. Whenever he exhausted himself, it was there, always asking, hungry. He kept it starved, afraid to let it loose.

“Doctor’s orders, Fitz, off to bed with you,” she said, bending down to support him as he stood. “Jesus, you’re running a fever as well.”

“Never used that much power all at once,” he replied. “Not for number eight, at least.”

“Coulson, I’m releasing the meeting so everyone can rest,” Simmons said, her soft, easy confidence in knowing how to take care of him projected over him and soothed the growing headache.

“Doctor’s orders,” Coulson agreed. “Everyone should go rest. We’ll reconvene tomorrow.”

* * *

Hunter watched Fitzsimmons go, intrigued and confused at the same time. Bobbi nudged him playfully as they headed to grab something to eat before retiring to their rooms.

“Have you ever met someone with that many abilities?” he asked her.

“No, I haven’t, but it’s interesting who gets them, isn’t it? Fitz doesn’t seem like the type to have any, let alone  _ twelve.  _ People are impressed that I  have two.”

“Still no update on the research on that, then,” Hunter stated. She shook her head.

“It’s not genetic, at least. We’ve tested generations on some Manifested, as you know, and it doesn’t go anywhere. It’s random chance, or fate, or destiny. Something that isn’t measurable and  trackable .”

“Hydra must hate that. They can’t predict who will and won’t Manifest, then.”

“They really did.”

“Well,” Hunter said, “better you than me. I can’t be trusted with such powers.”

“Oh, lord knows that that is true,” she said, and they laughed.

* * *

“I didn’t like that,” Fitz said as Simmons  led him into the bed in his room. His bags, indeed, had been brought to their rooms, Simmons’ was right across from his thankfully. “I don’t like feeling on display.”

“I don’t know, I liked them.”

“It’s not about liking them. The only people who have seen that much of my powers were you, Coulson, and May until today. And, you know, the institution.”

“They don’t really count as people, though, do they,” Simmons replied. 

“It’s going to be like that a lot, isn’t it. On display. Showing off. Demonstrating.”

“Probably.”

“Fuck me,” Fitz said, flopping onto his back. Simmons crawled into bed with him and he scooted over to give her space. 

“You need to get out of your head,” she said. “This will be good for you. You’ll be able to stretch your powers, like muscles, and your control will get better with training. And if you train against other powers, you’ll be able to test your limits against them as well. It’ll be good for both of us.”

“I don’t know if I want to train with them. You’re the only person I can’t hurt, and I still end up hurting you sometimes.”

“You’re not going to get better unless you try.”

“What if I make a fool out of myself?”

“Then you pick yourself up and try again. Just little steps in the right direction , remember? You just have to keep going, even with little steps.”

He groaned and rested his forehead against hers.

“You’re still very warm,” she said, reaching up to test the back of his neck. “I should go and let you sleep.”

“No, stay.”

She smiled softly, and her contentment washed over him, mingling with his own. They could stay there forever, just the two of them. 

“Can I tell you something?” he asked, flashing back to the conference room, locking eyes with Hunter and the way his emotions were sharper, more vibrant than everyone else’s.

“Of course.”

“When we were in the conference room, Hunter’s aura was too strong to block out,” he said into the space between them. 

“Oh!”

“I don’t know what it means.”

“Do you like him?”

“I don’t know him.”

“Do you want to make out with him?” she asked.

“He has a nice face,” he admitted. “A very kissable face.”

“So, you want to make out with him.”

“Yeah.”

“Fitz! That’s great!”

“How is that great?”

“You haven’t wanted to make out with anyone in like four years! This is a good step! We’re learning stuff already.”

“We don’t even know if he’s into men,” Fitz reminded her. “It could go absolutely nowhere.”

“That’s not the point, my dear Leopold. The point is this is the first physical attraction you’ve had to someone in years. That’s good!”

“I guess.”

“Besides that, you felt something enough to tell me about it without me having to pry! That’s progress! This place is going to be good for us. The team,  _ Hunter _ , is going to be good for us.”

“Yeah, maybe.”

She grinned, and he let himself relax in her presence. People were draining for Fitz. Being around people was a constant battle of fighting himself, and it was exhausting. But being around Simmons wasn’t like that. From day one, being around Simmons was like being alone, calming. 

“Do you still want me to stay?” 

“Always,” he replied, feeling the soft fingers of sleep reaching out towards him. “You and me forever, right?”

“Always. Heart and home, right here.”

* * *

Fitz kept coming to Hunter’s mind, even when he was focusing on other things. He tried not to, because Bobbi had warned him against fraternization inside of SHIELD, but he hadn’t met anyone quite like Fitz before. Fitz was clearly powerful, to what point he wasn’t sure, and he wasn’t sure even Fitz knew how powerful he could be. That in and of itself was intriguing. Beyond that, Fitz smiled like he didn’t know how, and hid away from the rest of the team. He was worn out by the end of their group training sessions, pulling double duty also fixing up the training room itself to withstand not only his powers but everyone else’s as well. Hunter didn’t even know him that well and he could see it, slipping away from the team afterwards to rest. 

He had no right to worry, but he felt it just the same. That was the thing about worry, he supposed, it never asked permission. It just settled in, and made itself at home inside of your chest, and would never really leave. 

* * *

Their first weeks with the team were tense, the team not quite sure how to act around each other. Fitz and Simmons kept mostly to themselves while Fitz did their upgrades to the training room, even after Coulson urged them to join the team for Team Building Exercises and Team Training Sessions. He spoke like that sometimes, Fitz noticed, as if every word was capitalized, as if every word was important and needed to be stressed.

Fitz tried joining in, but training left him exhausted, and he only had so much effort available afterwards for trying to keep out everyone else’s emotions and making friends at the same time. 

“Why don’t you go to the team meeting in the lounge tonight?” Simmons asked, passing him over a screwdriver when he held out his hand. “It might be good to get out of the lab, you know, and Hunter will be there.”

“I’m not interested,” Fitz said.

“Please,” Simmons said. “For me.”

So, even though Fitz wanted to go back to his room to sleep off his headache, he met Simmons at the lounge as a peel of laughter sounded from inside. 

“There you go! Progress!”

“Progress,” Fitz said less excited. “Woo.”

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah, head hurts, I guess, but I’ll be fine.”

“Come on, there will be beer and snacks. Promise.”

She took his hand and walked into the lounge, grinning at everyone as she entered. 

“I did the impossible!” she called and pushed Fitz into a seat beside Hunter. “Fitz has joined.”

“Go fuck yourself,” Fitz grumbled. She swept away to put together a plate with a  wink .

“Glad you could join us, mate . E veryone here was getting boring,” Hunter said with a smile that lit up Fitz from the inside. Fitz could usually tell when people were lying, just from how their emotions swirled around them. Hunter felt genuine though, his interest sharp like citrus. 

“Yeah,” Fitz said, turning to look at him, and their eyes caught. He really did have a nice face, pretty eyes, kissable lips. “ Have to keep you on your toes.”

Hunter’s laugh was  luminous,  radiating off of him .

“You certainly held out longer than anyone wagered,” Hunter said, “except Simmons, of course.”

“You bet on when I’d show up?”

“Yeah.”

“And you let Simmons in on this bet?”

“Yeah?” 

Fitz laughed, unable to help himself and pat Hunter on the shoulder, and said, “you got played, man. I’d demand a refund.”

Hunter looked over at Simmons who had a beer in her cardigan pocket for Fitz. 

“Really?”

“Oh, yeah, she could have had me here any day. All she had to do was ask.”

“Never would have taken her for the type,” Hunter said thoughtfully. “So, you and Simmons, are you?”

He trailed off with a suggestive eyebrow wiggle.

“Oh! No,” Fitz said too loudly and then blushed. Hunter had this curiosity about him, which didn’t sour at Fitz’s outburst for once. “No, no. We’re just friends.”

Hunter hummed at that response, eyes tracking over Fitz, assessing. Simmons swept back and set the food in Fitz’s lap with the pocket beer.

“You hustled us,” Hunter said as she sat down next to Fitz on the other side.

“I would never,” Simmons replied. “What are you telling people, Leopold?”

“Just that you fixed the bet so you’d win. The same thing you did at the Academy and  SciOps .”

“Share the pot and I won’t say a word,” Hunter said, leaning into Fitz’s space, hand on Fitz’s shoulder to steady himself. “Or at least give me back my money.”

Simmons gave Fitz an icy look as she took a ruffled wad of bills from her pocket and passed a twenty back over to Hunter.

“I didn’t really fix the bet anyway,” Simmons said. “I did ask him every time. He just always says no.”

“Barely,” Fitz said. Hunter’s hand stayed on his shoulder, and for a moment, it was all he could focus on. “Weird how you put on the puppy eyes once you would win.”

“I do not know what you are talking about,” Simmons said, taking up a crisp from Fitz’s plate. 

Somewhere during the night, between the  extremely loud  trivia games they played and the movie they’d settled into after a quick drinking game that Fitz definitely lost, or won depending on how you looked at it , Fitz’s headache was gone, and Hunter, still pressed up against him, was radiating the softest happiness.

“I’ll help you get back to your room if you want,” Hunter said in Fitz’s ear, low and husky. 

“Do I seem that pissed?” Fitz asked.

It wasn’t the alcohol he was drunk from, though. He’d never been around someone that made him  feel this free. Being around Lance Hunter felt a little like zero gravity, floating, untethered.

“Maybe I just want to get you alone,” Hunter said.

“You’re going to have to buy me dinner first.”

Simmons, teetering a little, fell into Fitz’s lap gracelessly.

“Hi,” she said. “I’m extremely tired.”

“Okay, we can go, then.”

“Can we do a number nine?”

Number nine, which always left Fitz instantly exhausted, was short range teleportation. The maximum distance he could go was a mile, but he immediately fell asleep for three days the last time he tried it.

“Yeah, we can.”

Fitz  paused, considered, and then  shifted them towards Hunter.

“What if I help you get back to your room instead?” he offered with his free hand out. 

“Yes!” Simmons said excitedly. She was always encouraging him to try something more, stretching his capabilities. 

“Are you sure?” Hunter asked, looking at his extended hand warily. But he wasn’t scared. Fitz really liked that, that Hunter wasn’t afraid of him no matter what he’d shown off.

“If you want.”

Hunter’s hand found Fitz’s, their fingers linking together.

“Ready?”

“Yeah!” Simmons said.

Drunk Simmons was just Simmons but Excitable. He loved any version of Simmons she had to offer, of course, but Drunk Simmons was always super fun to be around. She cheered him on and told him that she loved him loudly and complimented him often. 

Fitz looked over at Hunter, nervous excitement humming between them.

“Yeah,” Hunter echoed smaller, and squeezed Fitz’s hand.

Fitz  focused on the hallway between Simmons’ door and his, sensed it in the vicinity, and let his power take them there. It felt like his entire body was being pressed, his heart squeezed so hard he couldn’t breathe.

Then, they were there, Simmons pressed up against him with Hunter’s hand still in his. 

“Holy shit,” Hunter hissed, looking around up and down the hallway. “You - that – holy shit. Fitz.”

Simmons kissed Fitz on the cheek, and teetered to her door.

“Thank you, Fitz! Good job! I love you! Goodnight!”

Drunk Simmons was a walking explanation point. 

She let herself into the room and then, it was Hunter and Fitz alone in the hall. It was the first time they’d been properly alone. Without anyone else, Hunter was even brighter and invigorating than before, and it was wholly distracting. 

“You really are amazing, mate,” Hunter said. 

He hadn’t let go of Fitz’s hand yet.

“That was my ninth ability,” Fitz said, unsure  what  to say. “Manifested it right after Coulson and May brought me into SHIELD.”

“Could you take us  _ anywhere _ ?”

“I could take us anywhere inside of the compound,” Fitz replied. “Once. And then, I’d need a nap.”

“ Ahh .”

“I have a lot of abilities, but not all of them are powerful.”

He’d never taken more than one person on a teleport, and he felt the prompt need to lay down wash over him.

“I have no abilities except my exceptional charm, so you have me beat.”

“Yeah,” Fitz said awkwardly, reaching out to steady himself on the wall. 

“Do you need to lie down, mate?”

“I do.”

He moved his hand and pressed his code into the pad by the door.

“Do you want to come in?” Fitz asked, and he wasn’t sure why he asked. He wasn’t the type of person who invited strangers into his room. He barely knew Hunter, but god, he really wanted to.

“I’d love to, but not until you’re sober, yeah?”

Fitz hummed, nodding his understanding. There was a diffused longing around Hunter, hiding a spicy layer of arousal, clearly his conscience holding him back.

“You’re a good man, Lance Hunter.”

“You don’t even know me.”

“Call it intuition,” Fitz said, tapping the side of his nose and stepping back into the doorway. “Have a good night, Hunter.”

“You too, Fitz.”

* * *

Hunter could say no to someone who was drunk, because he may be an asshole but he wasn’t a scumbag, but that didn’t mean he didn’t teeter back to his own room, fall into bed, and have himself a glorious  wank . He pictured Fitz there with him, his hand warm and his gaze steady just like it had been in the lounge, his body pressed all along Hunter’s side. When he came, it was a miracle he didn’t shout Fitz’s name. 

* * *

Training was Fitz’s least favorite part of the day.  While he was technically a SHIELD agent and had been for years, he hadn’t ever been out in the field and he hadn’t been trained to be. He was more of a SHIELD  _ employee _ than an agent at any point. His sparring ability was dismal comparatively, and even with his powers, he ended up on his back below his partner more often than he was on his feet. It was starting to hurt. If he had to worry about bruises, he was sure his back would look like a road map of his failures.

“ Fitz , it’s like you’re not even trying,” Ward commented from the side of the mat as Daisy’s knee dug into his chest again as she had him pinned. 

“That’s the problem,” Fitz groaned. “I  _ am _ trying.”

“That’s really sad, then,” Ward said. “Daisy is even taking it easy on you.”

“I’ve been in a lab since I was sixteen,” he grunting, pushing Daisy’s knee off him. 

She helped him to his feet like she did every time, and then went back to their original positions.

“Hunter, you were a self-defense training instructor for a while, right?” May asked from her perch nearby, watching and evaluating. 

“Yeah,” he replied.

“Switch with Daisy. I think Fitz could benefit from a different teaching approach.”

Daisy dropped her attack stance and smiled shyly at him.

“Sorry, I tried.”

“It’s okay. I’m kind of used to the humiliation by now.”

Hunter stepped into Fitz’s section of the mat as Daisy walked to take his place with Simmons who had been holding her own just fine. 

“You’re really bad at this,” he started, stepping into Fitz’s space. “But that’s okay. Everyone here was a novice once too, even if they forget what it’s like just starting out.”

“Okay.”

“So, first, your form. What’s really important, more than strength or agility or talent is your form. This is your base, so when you get hit, proper footwork will keep you on your feet rather than landing on your back. It will allow you to bounce back and keep fighting, which is important.”

Hunter walked Fitz through standing and weight distribution, how to use momentum to rock back after being pushed, or hit. 

“Good,” Hunter said, the training session ending around them. “We can stop here if you want. You’ve got a good stance down.”

“Yeah,” Fitz said, but he could hear the uncertainty in his own voice, and saw the look in Hunter’s eyes that he noticed it too.

“Or we could try some practical applications.”

“Yeah, okay.”

Fitz didn’t want Hunter to stop touching him, even if it was just brushes as he adjusted Fitz’s posture, nudged his foot into place, reminded Fitz to keep his hands up by running his fingers along the length of Fitz’s arm.

“We’ll get to using your powers with your physical attacks later,” Hunter said. “But for right now, just in case, we’ll practice as if you’re just human, no abilities. I’ve heard Hydra Tech spies have been using inhibitors to prevent Manifested from using their powers against them. I want you to be able to fight and defend yourself just fine without your abilities.”

Hunter squared up in front of Fitz, gesturing for him to take his own position.

“Okay, if your opponent comes at you from the front, like this, you don’t have to be bigger or stronger than them. You’re smaller than most Hydra goons, which means you’ll be faster. You’ll want to use that to your advantage. Keep on your toes, keep moving, trying to wear them out.”

“Okay. Pretty basic.”

“Remember to keep your hands up. You’ve got too pretty of a face to ruin.”

Fitz rolled his eyes, but he could feel himself blush at the edges.

“Just keep moving, okay? It’s harder to hit a moving target.”

The first hit took Fitz by surprise, but Hunter was entirely correct that by fixing his stance, he could use that momentum to shift and stay upright rather than falling flat on his back.

Hunter grinned at him, at his recovery.

“That’s good, Fitz. Don’t be afraid to hit back, but only if you feel like it’s not opening you up for another hit. One hit is easy to bounce back from; it gets harder two or more. This is more defensive than offensive.”

“Shouldn’t I learn offensive as well?”

“Are you going to be picking fights?”

“No,” Fitz said.

“Then, defensive is best for now. Once you’re more confident and have the defensive skills, we can work on offensive. But I’m just going for keeping you alive until help arrives right now.”

“I can’t argue with that.”

The next swing caught Fitz in the jaw, knocking him off balance and to the side, but he was at least able to stay on his feet and duck under Hunter’s following swipe.

“Good! Very good, Fitz! Keep that energy! Keep moving.”

Fitz could see Ward hanging out to the side, arms crossed across his chest. His own anxiety over Ward’s scrutiny distracted him, and Hunter was able to catch him again, this time sending him to the ground. Hunter followed him down to the ground with a smile.

“Rule number one, Fitz, don’t get distracted.” He sat down beside Fitz before continuing,  “you are doing very well, you know, considering. You only fell once since we started.”

“You just started hitting me.”

“Well, you didn’t fall during the lecture part.”

Fitz laughed.

“We can keep training, if you want, outside of the normal hours that way you don’t have someone watching and distracting you,” he said. He directed that at Ward who took the hint to leave as well. “Private sessions, just you and me?”

“That would be fine,” Fitz said. “I’d like that.”

Hunter helped him stand.

“Okay, let’s see if you can get a hit in before I get you on your back again,” Hunter said with a salacious wink. 

* * *

It was entirely selfish, of course, to offer one-on-one sessions with Fitz, giving him almost free reign to touch Fitz . The thing was, Fitz agreed to it. He agreed to keep training after the session had ended, to stay even though Hunter knew he hated it, to stay because it was Hunter there with him. He was learning how to read Fitz, still, of course, but he could tell when someone was interested in him. So, he asked for more sessions with Fitz, just to get him alone. The fact that Fitz also needed the help was secondary, honestly, because he wanted that excuse to run his fingertips along Fitz’s skin as he adjusted a stance, or feel Fitz bump into him as they sparred. It was – it was the best thing Hunter had experienced in a long time.

* * *

At lunch one afternoon, Daisy sank into a seat opposite Fitz and stared at him for a long while.

“Can I help you?”

“You fascinate me.”

“Thanks?”

“I want to get to know you better, Leo Fitz. I think it’s important to know the team, of course, but there’s something about you that makes me really interested in you.”

“Is it the unusual amount of powers? Or the sad past? The accent?”

“I don’t know, it’s a little bit of everything, and I have a curiosity that I can’t deny.”

There was an honest curiosity humming around her, vibrating the air, tingling in Fitz’s ears. She was leaned over the table, elbows against the wood while her hands propped up her head. It was adorable. 

“What exactly are you curious about?”

“Everything!” she said excitedly. “But also, specifically your powers. Because, okay – I recognize that you are a full human being and you are not just your powers. I get that. I understand the entire SHIELD Manifested empowerment speech. But you are fascinating. Like, you have twelve powers?” 

“Not on purpose.”

“I know! That’s what’s amazing!”

He glanced around automatically. It was a relatively empty compound, just the team and some trusted security guards that they almost never saw. He didn’t have to worry about people overhearing here for once. Everyone here already knew about him. It was actually a relief, but that didn’t mean he didn’t fall back on making sure he was safe first.

“How do you keep control of it?” she asked when he turned back. “Of all of it?”

He shrugged.

“I barely do sometimes. That’s what I have Simmons for, right? Handling it?”

Daisy was quiet for a minute.

“Why?”

“I just, I only got my powers a couple of years ago. And before Grant, it literally was tearing me apart.” She gestured to scars on her arms. “And I’m terrified of them.”

Fitz knew what that felt like. 

He considered her, looking the scars over, then to her face. Waves of uncertainty came off of Daisy like a dry heat, but beneath it, he could feel the tenuous hope she was kindling that Fitz, that  _ Fitz  _ could help her. 

He cautiously reached out and put his hand over her arm, the tiny raised edges of her scars beneath his skin anchoring him to his decision.

“We can work on it together, if you want. I don’t have perfect control, but I also don’t think that would be helpful if I had all the answers. Sometimes, it’s a struggle even with all of the right techniques and guidance, so we can work together to help you with this.”

Daisy smiled at him, soft and warm. 

“Are you sure?”

“I used to almost burn down the institution when I was scared,” Fitz said, trying for conversationally even though the nightmares that caused his flare ups still followed him into adulthood. “What I needed back then was someone to tell me that it was okay, and that I had control over my powers. You have control over your powers, Daisy. They don’t have control over you, and we will figure it out.”

She turned her arm and moved to catch his hand, sliding their fingers together.

“Besides, I have a lot of questions about Simmons.”

He laughed, delighted. 

“Oh, you came to the right place for information on Simmons.”

* * *

“He’s cute,” Bobbi said when she caught Hunter staring after Fitz one night. They’d been hanging out, Fitz sitting at his side until Jemma had called for them to get some sleep. “But you need to be careful. He’s fragile like a bomb.”

“He’s not going to hurt me,” Hunter said, rolling his eyes. 

“No, maybe not intentionally,” Bobbi said. “But just be careful, Hunter. I still care about you, no matter what happened between us. You’re my best friend, babe, and I don’t want to see you drown yourself in meaningless sex and cheap scotch.”

“I won’t. He’s probably not even interested in me that way.”

“Oh, he is,” Bobbi said, “and you know he is.”

“I don’t,” Hunter said stubbornly.

“Oh,  _ please _ , he stares at you like he wants to taste your tonsils.”

“That doesn’t mean he’d date me just because he’s attracted to me. There’s plenty of people I want to suck off, that doesn’t mean I want to take them on a date and listen to them talk about their doctorate.”

“Do you want to listen to him talk about his doctorate?”

“Yes, but that doesn’t mean he feels the same.”

Bobbi pat his arm gently and sighed.

“Just, don’t get in over your head, babe.”

* * *

“Hey,” Fitz said,  jogging to catch up with Hunter on the way to the kitchen. “Bobbi said I might find you here.”

“Oh?”

“Mack mentioned that you like football, and I’ve been without a match since I got here.”

“I do,” Hunter agreed. “There’s a match on in a couple minutes. If you wanted to join me.”

“Yes, actually, that would be great. Who’s playing?”

“Liverpool versus Arsenal today.”

Fitz made a face.

“What?” Hunter asked.

“Which one do you support?”

“Liverpool, of course. Why? Who’s your team?”

“Man U.”

“Nope, nope, friendship over. Can’t be friends with someone who likes _ Manchester _ .”

Fitz rolled his eyes.

“I can’t believe you like Liverpool, so we’re even,” Fitz said, but there wasn’t anything mean, or dismissive about it. This is what Hunter missed about the army, the camaraderie with his fellow soldiers. He could joke with them about their respective football clubs, and who had the worse team. 

“Come on,” Hunter said, nodding towards the lounge where he’d been watching the matches for the past couple of weeks. “I’ve got a good set up ready.”

Fitz grinned, and followed him into the lounge. 

Mack was making a sandwich when they entered, and raised an eyebrow.

“What -- are you going to watch soccer in here?”

“No, we’re going to watch  _ football,”  _ Hunter corrected as he always had. Mack sighed.

“I’ll take this back to my room, then.”

“You don’t have to,” Fitz started to protest, but Mack held up his hand.

“It’s alright, I don’t mind. Hunter and I have a long history of not agreeing on this, and I haven’t had enough coffee, food, or sleep to have an argument.”

“He means to lose an argument,” Hunter commented.

“Arguing with Hunter feels like talking to a brick wall, sometimes,” Mack said to Fitz. “Especially when he gets it into his thick head that he’s right, even when facts say he’s not.”

“What are facts to someone who’s right?”

Fitz made a face at that.

“Good luck,” Mack said, clapping Fitz on the back as he passed. “Maybe you can talk some sense into him.”

They settled into the couch, side by side, and Hunter switched the television over to the match. It was just starting, perfect timing. It didn’t matter that his team was losing in the first quarter already, because Fitz was smiling, and bantering, and he looked so  _ free _ . Since they’d met, Fitz always held himself like he was afraid of himself, careful with his touches, with how he moved. But this Fitz was loud, and laughed openly, and shouted at the television right beside Hunter, even if Liverpool wasn’t his team.

During a commercial break, Hunter was reaching for a snack from the table.

“Do you want to go out with me? Like, on a date, not just hanging out in the lounge with the match on,” Fitz asked suddenly, and when Hunter turned to looked at Fitz, he watched as a look of confusion and panic crossed Fitz’s face as he registered what his mouth had done. 

“Yes,” Hunter said before Fitz could back down. “I would love that, actually.”

* * *

Somehow, Fitz ended up on a date with Lance Hunter.

He wasn’t complaining, of course. Hunter was kind of everything Fitz ever wanted, which was a weird feeling. He was objectively attractive, of course, but beyond that, Hunter was smart, and confident, and smart-mouthed, and unafraid. He put Fitz at ease and set his nerves on fire somehow at the same time. 

He just wasn’t sure how it happened.

Even after replaying it multiple times, he could not place the exact moment when they’d gone from talking about their respective football teams, to Hunter agreeing to go on a date with him. Because, yeah, his mouth did that. His mouth formed the words that conveyed to Hunter that he wanted to ask him out.

There hadn’t been a conscious thought to it. It just.

Happened.

“What do I even wear on a date?”

“Clothing is preferable,” Daisy said, reclined on his bed with a bag of crisps she was munching on. Simmons, sat at the desk, nodded. “Well, most of the time. I don’t know what Hunter’s kinks are.”

“I would be interested in seeing what kind of dates you can go on without clothing,” Simmons said. “Maybe not you personally, Fitz, no offense, but –”

“I would,” Daisy said, interjecting. 

“This is not helpful,” Fitz said before they could go on, trying to draw them back into helping him. “Clothes. Date. Help.”

“I’m sure whatever you choose, Hunter will love it,” Simmons answered.

Daisy hopped up from the bed, passing the bag of crisps to Simmons, joining Fitz at his closet. 

“Okay, let’s see,” she said. “We want to avoid cardigans, because as cute as they are, they don’t make you look  fuckable .”

“What if I’m not going for  fuckable ?” he asked.

“I quite like Fitz in cardigans,” Simmons added.

“You should always be going for  fuckable on the first date, Fitz. And you’re not the one dating him, Simmons.”

“What if I don’t want to fuck Hunter on the first date?”

“That’s not the point. The point is setting it up so you can fuck him later when you’re ready.”

“Shouldn’t he want to fuck me even if I’m wearing cardigans?”

“I mean, in theory,” Daisy said, rifling through his clothes without pause. “But we live in a society where clothes and appearance matter, unfortunately, and you want to make a good impression, one that you care about Hunter and what he thinks of you, and that you are putting effort into your relationship with him. When was the last time you went on a date, Fitz?”

Fitz and Simmons traded a look, searching their collective memory.

“Years,” he said.

“Like, Academy years.”

“Holy shit, really?” Daisy asked, looking between them.

“With my past, I don’t tend to feel attraction to people. It’s hard to explain. It’s not quite asexuality, or  demisexuality , but who I’m attracted to is either really specific criteria, or maybe moving criteria. I don’t know. It's rare that I like anyone, and even rarer that I want to do anything with them.”

“It’s okay,” Daisy said. “You don’t have to justify it. You’re not wrong or anything for not dating, Fitz.”

This is why Fitz felt a kinship with Daisy, an instant friendship he hadn’t felt since Simmons had stepped into his life. 

“Thanks,  Daise .”

She smiled and kissed his cheek.

“Here,” she said, pulling out a pair of his better jeans, no chemical stains or rips from lab accidents, and then a light blue button-up shirt. “This is tantalizing and  fuckable , but still a little shy and reserved. Perfect for you.”

“Are you sure?”

“Put it on. See how you feel.”

He sighed and took the clothes. He stepped behind the privacy curtain in his bunk while the girls chatted idly about their last dates. 

“I went on a date with Ward, actually, not my last one, but it put me off dating for a while,” Daisy said. “It was right after our bond solidified, and there was that high where we just wanted to be around each other, so we thought that that was attraction, you know? I mean, I am attracted to Ward, but not like that, you know. That’s more of a  _ he’s nice to look at _ kind of thing.”

“Agreed,” Simmons said.

“I can  agree to that as well,” Fitz said, slowly buttoning up the shirt. 

“Would you fuck Ward if you were into fucking people?” Daisy asked.

“He’s hot,” Fitz stated. “If I were into random hookups, and he were into men, maybe.”

“Good to know.”

“How is that good to know? What are you doing to do with that information?”

“I don’t know. Yet. But I’ll figure something out. I always do. Now, come on out, my love. Let’s see.”

He straightened his collar and stepped out from behind the curtain, presenting himself for their judgement with an awkward flourish of his hands. 

“ Fuckable ,” Simmons said.

Daisy was grinning, hands on her hips, clearly proud of her work.

“Come here,  Fitzy .”

She stepped him forward to look in the mirror on the back of the closet door, stood behind him and fixed the outfit.

“Okay, so see how this shirt kind of clings to your frame right here, from your shoulders to your hips. You’re quite fit for a scientist, Fitz.”

“It’s the lifting heavy objects,” Fitz replied. “Simmons is a little jacked herself. You should see her shoulders.”

Daisy took a breath, and Fitz could feel the unexpected wave of interest roll off of Daisy, followed by a wave of surprise. She hadn’t expected that to affect her either.

“Putting a pin in that. Back to you. Look at how this shirt accents your torso and waist, and then how good your hips and legs look in these jeans. You’re not only  fuckable , Fitz, but you’re downright dateable. Like, you’re the kind of guy a person can bring home to their parents. You’re husband material.”

It set a glow in Fitz’s chest he couldn’t understand. 

“I’d bring you home to Mom and Dad,” she said, but there was a confusion in her aura.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, catching her eye in the mirror.

“What do you mean?”

“Something’s wrong. I can just feel it.”

“I grew up an orphan, as you know. My mom was one of the first Manifested cases, and my dad tried to make himself into a Manifested, which meant they were hunted and pursued, misunderstood for her gifts and labelled a threat. They left me at an orphanage to grow up and bounce between foster homes, which I get, but they only recently came back into my life, and gave me my real name, and – it's all very confusing still. I’m trying to get used to it, having a Mom and a Dad, but it’s still new.”

He nodded and squeezed her hand where she had it resting on his bicep.

“I’d be honored if you took me home to your Mum and Dad, Daisy.”

She grinned.

“Well, let’s start with getting you home with Hunter.”

He rolled his eyes.

“Is he coming to pick you up or are you meeting him at his bunk?” Daisy asked, stepping away to go back to his closest. He watched her consider his belts and shoes. He didn’t have a huge variety, beyond some were appropriate for the lab and some were appropriate for meetings. 

“You mean, the bunk ten meters down the hall?”

“Yes,” Daisy agreed. 

“He’s picking me up,” he said, and then added before Daisy could say anything, “don’t make a big thing out of this. It’s just picking me up for a date.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You have a look.”

She shrugged, passing him a belt and picking out his shoes. 

“I’m glad you’re happy, Fitz.”

“We don’t know what is actually going to happen, though. I might go on a date with Hunter, and then it turns out to fucking suck. You know? He might be a bad kisser,  or he might be pushy.”

Daisy caught his gaze.

“Do you think he’s going to be pushy?”

“No,” he admitted. “He’s really nice, and he’s actually a really good friend.”

“You don’t have to worry about him,” Simmons said. “You know he’s good.”

“Yeah, I do,” Fitz agreed. “He is.”

“Okay, let me look you over, one last time,” Daisy said. He presented himself for her scrutiny, and she stepped forward to adjust his shirt and smooth back his hair a little, as much as it would be smoothed. “You are absolutely ready to win him over. This message is approved by Daisy Johnson herself.”

“Thank you. I’d probably still be fumbling with my buttons if you weren’t here,” he said, speaking to both of them. “I can’t thank you enough.”

There was a knock at his door, which Simmons jumped up to answer, taking the bag of crisps with her. She opened the door, leaning over the frame to obscure Hunter’s view into the room.

“Can I help you?” she asked.

“Yeah,  uhhh , this is Fitz’s room, isn’t it?”

Fitz could see him look around, at the door marker, and at the keypad with Fitz’s name.

“Yes, it is. Leave him alone, Simmons,” he said.

“He didn’t even bring you flowers,” Daisy teased, coming up behind Simmons to peek at Hunter.

“He planned an entire date, leave him alone,” Fitz said. He grabbed his phone and tucked it away into his back pocket in case of emergency, and came up behind the girls. “Now, shoo.”

“Alright, alright,” Daisy said, stepping aside to let him pass. He stepped next to Hunter, and he could sense her pleased expression more than see it. 

“We should go before she asks for pictures like its prom night or something,” Fitz said to Hunter.

“Knock his socks off,” Daisy called to them as Fitz pulled Hunter away from her and Simmons. “Love you! Have him home by midnight, Hunter!”

“Please ignore her,” Fitz said. 

“Always, love,” Hunter said. “Ready?”

“Yeah,” Fitz said, and Hunter took his hand to lead him away from the bunks. “What’s the plan?”

“You’ll see. It’s a surprise.”

“What if I don’t like surprises?”

Hunter grinned at him.

“Oh, you’ll like this one.”

Fitz marveled at Hunter’s open and honest excitement, let it seep into him and infect him. He’d willingly let himself drown in the other’s enthusiasm.

“Is it illegal?”

“It’s not illegal.”

“It is frowned upon?”

“No. What kind of man do you think I am, Fitz?”

“The kind who breaks the rules when he feels like it.”

Hunter considered this, taking them to the elevator up to the topside of the Lighthouse.

“You were a mercenary before you joined Bobbi at SHIELD,” Fitz continued with Hunter’s silence.  “Notorious rule-breakers, mercenaries.”

“That’s extremely limiting, that view of mercenaries, Agent Fitz. I didn’t take you as the type to stereotype so blatantly.”

“Am I wrong, though?”

Hunter grinned.

“I want to tell you yes, that I’m a man of mystery and I have many facets, but it’s not good to start a relationship with lies, is it?”

Fitz playfully bumped him and said, “I know you’re more than meets the eye, Hunter. And I’m excited to get to know you and all of your many facets.”

“Even if I’m a lawless mercenary bad boy?”

“Especially because you’re a lawless mercenary bad boy. And because you are the kind of person who lets Jemma Simmons take them in a bet about her best friend.”

Hunter laughed.

“You liked that?”

“Of course, I did.”

Fitz elected not to elaborate, and he could feel Hunter’s curiosity as they stepped into the elevator to the top floor. Hunter kept peaking over at Fitz as if Fitz couldn’t see him, but it was incredibly cute and Fitz didn’t comment on it, happy to just be in his space.

“Where are we going?” Fitz asked as they stepped off the elevator and didn’t head to the entrance. Instead, they turned towards the backyard.

“You’ll see.”

Fitz turned to ask again, but Hunter tugged them down the hall to cut off his questions. He followed, his own curiosity leading him on. Hunter paused at the door to the courtyard, turning to face him.

“Okay, are you prepared to go on a little bit of an adventure?”

“What’s happening right now?”

“Are you prepared?”

There was excitement buzzing around Hunter, in the curve of his smile, in the bright of his eyes. Fitz would have said yes to anything he’d asked.

“Yes.”

“Good. Come with me, then.”

The sky was dark as they stepped out into the courtyard, the sun having just set, leaving the sky a bruised blue-black. The night air where it touched him was chilly, but Hunter’s body heat against his kept the chill from setting in.

“What are you up to?” Fitz asked, looking around for some kind of sign of what the surprise was.

“What? Don’t you trust me?”

“I barely know you,” he replied. “Besides, most first dates are at movies or restaurants, you know.”

Hunter grinned and said, “and why would we want just a typical first date?”

“That’s an excellent question. Why  _ would _ we want just a typical first date?”

“The fact of the matter is that you, Fitz, deserve a unique first date that isn’t just run of the mill dinner and drinks. What kind of impression would that leave?”

Hunter led him over to a ladder that rose up to the roof of the Lighthouse’s topside. Then, to Fitz’s equal delight and horror, he started to climb.

“Where are you going?” he hissed, looking around for someone to yell at them. 

“Clearly, I’m going up,” Hunter said. “Are you afraid of heights?”

“No, but –”

“Then, come on.”

“Aren’t we going to get in trouble?”

“For exploring? You know that we’re adults, right?”

“Yeah,” Fitz said, still nervous. He hadn’t ever rebelled; he hadn’t had a chance to. “I don’t know, I’m not used to this stuff.”

It felt like he was a teenager, coltish and new to the world. He’d felt like he was catching up to everyone else still, inexperienced and naïve, even years out from the institution. That place had stunted his growth, kept him trapped in anxieties he might have grown out of in a normal environment.

“Come on, then,” Hunter said gently. “Let me show you something amazing.”

Fitz took a deep breath to steady himself and began to climb. It wasn’t a tall building, so they reached the top easily and Fitz paused at the top to look out across the courtyard. Everything was in shadow, the track, the obstacle course, the picnic area with the grill, except for the patch of lawn where someone had left a lantern on. And above the courtyard, the stars glittered in the sky. Fitz stared up at the constellations, twinkling soft and excited in the endless black of space, the star light reflected in the lake below. 

But down on the roof, Hunter had set up a small projector pointed at the roof access stairwell wall. There was a comforter spread out on the ground covered in pillows and other smaller blankets, and around the edges, he had laid out various movie snacks and drinks for Fitz to choose from.

“Wow,” he breathed. “Is this all for me?”

“Yeah,” Hunter replied, holding his hand out to gesture Fitz to the blanket. “I’m not taking anyone else on a date, am I?”

“I hope not. That’d be extremely awkward. I was an only child, I never learned how to share.”

Hunter laughed.

“How’d you put this together so fast?  _ I  _ asked  _ you _ out _ today.” _

_ “ _ Fitz,” Hunter said seriously. “I asked you out pretty much every day since that first party you came to. I thought you were just ignoring me, ignoring the very obvious ask-outs, because you weren’t interested. Except that you invited me into your room when you were drunk and I didn’t want to take advantage, but you wouldn’t do that if you weren’t attracted to me, I don’t think.”

“What if I was the type to play mind games?”

“You’re not,” Hunter said simply. “But I’ve been thinking about what we would do on a date. I didn’t want to do the usual movie and dinner, since at a theater, you can’t really talk. I want to get to know you.”

Fitz couldn’t stop himself from smiling at that, Hunter a glowing ball of excitement and dancing nerves.

“And then, you asked me out first today so I wasn’t about to let you change your mind because planning a date is stressful.”

“I’m not going to change my mind, you know.”

Hunter nodded, but there was a wariness tingeing his excitement. Fitz knew if he kept pushing, he might scare Hunter away, and he didn’t know if he could handle that.

“So, what movie are we watching?” Fitz asked. “Nothing scary, I hope.”

“Not a fan of horror, then, love?”

“It’s fine, but typically, people use horror films to just get their date close.”

“Is being close such a bad thing?” Hunter asked.

“Not at all. But if you want to be close to me, I’d prefer you just say so. You don’t have to use tricks.”

“I would like to sit close to you, Leo Fitz, and even hold your hand if you’ll let me.”

“I would like that.”

Hunter took his hand, threading their fingers together. 

“And to answer your question, we’re going to be watching one of my favorite films, and don’t you dare laugh,  Jumanji .”

“Why would I laugh? It’s a good film.”

“Bob says that it’s weird, that I’m the type of who should like racing cars and exploding buildings.”

“That’s kind of your life already, though, isn’t it?”

“Yeah,” Hunter agreed.

“I think it’s cute,” Fitz said. “I don’t believe in traditional gender roles, or stereotypes of what types of things men should and shouldn’t like, you know? If you want to watch  Jumanji , I support that.”

Hunter nudged him playfully.

“Okay. What about you, then? What’s your favorite movie?”

“Finding Nemo,” he said with half a shrug. He wasn’t ashamed the way most people expected him to be.

“Why’s that?”

“I didn’t really watch any movies while I was at the institution. We could only watch educational television or anti-Manifested propaganda, short films teaching us that our abilities were wrong, that we were mistakes and demons, that we should feel ashamed. You know the type. But, that’s not the point. I didn’t see any movies for six years, so when SHIELD came and got me out, one of the things Simmons did was reintroduce me to the world, and pop culture. The first movie I saw after the institution was Finding Nemo.”

“That’s actually really sweet.”

“I mean, I do end up crying nearly every time,” Fitz said, “but —”

“Why?”

“I suspect it’s caused by my abilities. One of my abilities is empathy, I can literally feel what people are feeling, and for whatever reason, I get this hard hit of relief and joy whenever I watch it. I don’t know what causes it.”

“Your own emotions make you cry?”

Fitz shrugged.

“You really are a wonder, Fitz. I could spend the rest of my life getting to know you and I’m not sure even then would be enough.”

“I could say the same about you. I’ve never met anyone like you.”

Hunter’s whole emotional aura blushed with contentment, and he turned away to start up the movie. Fitz studied the way the light from the projector played over Hunter’s features, casting shadows as he moved.

“There’s also,” Hunter said, pausing what he was doing to grab what looked like an actual picnic basket, and brought it back to the blanket, “dinner. Sort of.”

“Sort of? What’s  _ sort of _ dinner?”

Hunter fished out a plastic wrapped plate of sandwiches, and a bag of crisps.

“If you’re hungry afterward, we can go raid the kitchen, but I thought I’d start here.”

“What? You weren’t going to cook me a full five course dinner on top of putting together a home theater picnic in an afternoon?” Fitz teased.

“You don’t want me cooking for you, love.”

“Not good at cooking, then?”

“Terrible.”

“That’s okay. I can teach you.”

“What?  _ You  _ can cook?”

“Why does that surprise you? After six years of cardboard and paste se rv ed on chipping tin trays, I was done not enjoying my food. So, Simmons and I took cooking classes while we were at the Academy.”

“That’s extremely resourceful.”

“Thank you. I had to learn a lot of things really quickly, like social cues and how to dress myself.”

“I’m sorry that happened to you, Fitz.” 

And for once, Fitz knew that he meant it.

“So, sandwiches,  Jumanji , anything else?” he said, trying to distract them from his past.

“Some other surprises depending on how the night goes.”

“Alright, keep your secrets then.”

Hunter started up the movie and unwrapped the sandwich platter.

They sat through the DVD trailers while they ate, sitting close enough to brush elbows when they moved. It was a good quiet, companionable. 

“What made you join the team?” Fitz asked, taking a crisp from the bag offered to him. “You didn’t seem thrilled to be here when we first arrived.”

“We came here for Bobbi,” Hunter replied. “She’s an excellent agent, and she’s got control of her abilities now, but she felt isolated and absolutely jumped at the opportunity. I’m happy to follow Bobbi anywhere, but this weirded me out. It seemed like putting together a team of Manifested is a recipe for disaster, asking for someone to explode.”

Fitz nodded. He’d felt the same apprehensions. Except, he was the explosion waiting to happen.

“But Bobbi wanted to come, wanted to try, and we bonded for a reason, you know. Who am I to tell her no when it’s my job, my very soul’s work to keep her safe and happy?”

“Simmons is usually the first person to tell me no,” he replied.

Hunter smiled at him, amused.

“I actually wanted to ask you the same thing. Why’d you join this team?”

“Simmons, actually. She was restless in the lab, and when Coulson approached us, I think she jumped for the same reason that Bobbi did. And I trust Simmons, probably too much at this point. I followed where she led, and she led me here. It was the best decision ever.”

Hunter looked over at him, hazel eyes dark in the shadows, but somehow thoughtful.

“So, hold on, you were basically imprisoned for six years, and you somehow ended up an engineering genius on the other side?”

“Not quite. I’ve always been intelligent, even when I was young, so I studied while I was in the institution. I was clever enough to finish their course work before I was fourteen so I was granted college courses to keep me busy and out of their hair. It wasn’t until I met Simmons and joined the Academy that I cared about engineering at all. Simmons challenged me, made me want to succeed, and be better than my dad ever thought I could be. It was SHIELD and the Academy that made me into an engineering genius, if you want to call it that, not the institution.”

“You’re absolutely right,” Hunter agreed. “Has someone burned that place to the ground yet?”

“No, but I’d certainly be okay with watching it go up in flames.”

“Second date,” Hunter decided.

“So confident that tonight will go that well?”

“Always.”

Fitz took another crisp and looked at the screen, the menu playing out waiting for them.

“I thought about it, actually. My first power is fire manipulation. I easily could have burned it all down with a thought, and watched as all of their rotten ideals and horrific goals turned to ash. But there were so many kids like me in there, scared and alone. Kids who were being brainwashed into believing that they were broken, that they were cursed. All of those kids, if a single one of them was hurt, that would be on me. So many kids, and I couldn’t save them. Even now, with the bonding process and the protections, the institution is full of kids in need, and we can’t do anything to save them. Burning it down would be nice, but I couldn’t cause them any more suffering to satisfy that urge.”

Hunter nodded along like he understood. Maybe he did. Fitz barely knew Hunter, which he hoped to change, so he wasn’t sure what Hunter had actually been through. 

“I’m sure we can find a way to shut them down. We are SHIELD after all,” Hunter said. “Even if it’s set a bunch of kids free and then burn the place to the ground.”

Fitz laughed.

“Thanks, Hunter.”

Hunter squeezed his knee and reached over to start the movie. For once, Fitz felt right at home with someone, a non-Simmons someone. He leaned into Hunter, happy to just be near him. In return, Hunter scooched closer and let Fitz’s weight rest against him. 

“I’m sure you’ve heard this a million times since, but it deserves repeating; you’re not broken or cursed because of your powers. You’re incredible, without them, and I will spend as much time as it takes to show you that.”

Fitz found Hunter’s hand and laced their fingers together again, happier than he could ever remember being. 

* * *

“It’s just not possible,” Hunter argued. The movie had ended an hour ago, and they were still sat on the comforter,  picking at the snacks idly. 

“Are you calling me a liar?”

“No,” he replied, “but I’m not sure you’re telling the truth either.”

“Why would I lie about this?”

“I don’t know, but there is no way that your first kiss was with a guy named  _ Fred _ _ Fredson _ .”

“It was! He’s a real person!”

“How could his parents look at this sweet newborn baby boy and name him  _ Fred  _ _ Fredson _ ?”

“I didn’t get to know his parents so I can’t tell you that.”

Hunter considered him for a moment.

“ I’m definitely going to look him up later, and not because I don’t believe you, but also because I don’t believe you a little bit.”

“Do you think I made up my first kiss? Why would I do that?”

“I don’t know, maybe to avoid telling me that you’ve never been kissed before.”

“I don’t have a lot of experience,” Fitz defended, “but I’m not a thirty-year-old virgin.”

“ Alright,”  Hunter conceded, smiling at Fitz like he was something precious. “Not that I would have minded either way.”

Fitz playfully hit Hunter and pushed him so he teetered a little.

It was starting to get colder, and even with Hunter’s body heat beside him, he was starting to get goosebumps along his arms. 

“We should go inside,” Hunter said when a cold chill ran down the length of Fitz's spine with a gust of wind off the lake. His eyes tracked over Fitz’s form, and he rubbed his hand up and down Fitz’s arm to warm him up. “I have dessert in the freezer, assuming Bobbi didn’t find it.”

They gathered up the snacks in the center of the comforter and made a  little sack of it which Hunter tucked into a corner under a tarp with the projector, promising he’d take care of it tomorrow.

Hunter led the way down the ladder and started off towards the door out of the courtyard before a noise nearby stalled him right in front of Fitz. He turned, quick as anything, and  moved himself and Fitz into a shadowy corner just as Bobbi and Daisy followed by Simmons walked by. Hunter covered his mouth with his hand and pressed  the length of his body along Fitz's.

“Stay still and they won’t know we’re here,” Hunter muttered.

Fitz  rolled his eyes but kept still.

“You do not want Bobbi joining this date,” he continued under his breath , moving his hand to Fitz's  neck.

“ Not a voyeur, then?”

Hunter had to bite back  a laugh, shaking his head. 

“You’re a delight.”

Fitz grinned.

Mack  walked by next, chatting idly with Yo-Yo as they followed the girls across the courtyard.

“Looks like you’re stuck here with me for a while, Fitz,” Hunter said.

“That’s okay. I’m warming up.”

Hunter’s eyes flicked down to Fitz's mouth for a second then back up to his eyes.

“ Can I kiss you?”

“Yes, please,” Fitz  said. 

Hunter leaned in slow, brushing the tip of his nose along Fitz's cheek, lips ghosting along his jaw over to the corner of his lips. He left a kiss there before moving along, breathing in Fitz's breaths out. Then, just when Fitz was about ready to burst, Hunter connected their lips. Fitz was starting to learn that everything with Hunter was different, that  _ Hunter  _ himself was different. His few kisses and sexual encounters before were rushed, sloppy, and unimpressive. Hunter took his time. The kiss was unhurried, his thumb stroking over his jaw while he shifted to be closer to Fitz. 

A wave of satisfaction and adoration  swept between them, swirling around  them like  a tornado.

Fitz dragged Hunter closer by the front of his shirt, pleased at the small noise of surprise and pleasure he let out.

“Oh, it’s like that, is it?” Hunter asked, breaking the kiss just to leave smaller, sweeter kisses  against Fitz's lips. “Two can play that game, mister.”

“It’s Agent, actually,” Fitz joked as Hunter’s hands ran down the length of his torso to his hips. 

“Well,  _ Agent _ Fitz,” Hunter said, nipping his lower lip t easing ly. The shiver that ran through him only egged Hunter on. “ Let me know if you want to stop.”

“Never,” Fitz whimpered. 

Hunter  kissed him again, open and wet and somehow perfect, distracting him from his hand slipping up inside the fabric of his shirt and along his skin. 

Fitz knew he was noisy, that he couldn’t control the little whimpers and moans, heavy breaths like gusts of air. One of his previous partners, years ago, had been bothered by them, said that he sounded like a cam boy begging for tips, a wave of genuine sour annoyance surrounding them as he said it. But as Hunter traced designs into his skin and kissed him like he cared, Hunter felt like home, green and bright and warm like a Scottish summer afternoon. 

He let himself make the noises, muffled into Hunter’s  kisses.

“God,  _ Fitz _ ,” Hunter groaned himself. 

There was a shout and a peel of laughter from the  other side of the courtyard.

“We should slow down,” Fitz said, forcing himself to break away. He was breathing heavy, half hard in his jeans, and if he didn’t then, he was going to let Hunter have him right there where the rest of the team could see. Maybe he was a little voyeuristic. Just for Hunter, though, just  _ with  _ him.

“Yeah,” Hunter agreed.  “Besides, there’s dessert downstairs waiting for us.”

Dessert, Fitz thought, tracing  the side of Hunter’s chest absently, sounded excellent. 

“ I could go for dessert.”

* * *

“Holy shit,” Hunter said at Team Dinner one night a week later, scrolling through a tablet he’d commandeered from the situation room. Fred  Fredson’s face was staring at him from the file he’d dug up, a wiry man with glasses and a crooked smile.

“What?” Bobbi asked, nudging him when he didn’t continue.

“Fred  Fredson is a real fucking person.”

Fitz snorted, catching his gaze. The team looks confused between them, but Fitz  didn’t clarify and neither did Hunter.

* * *

Daisy had been acting strange for a couple of days, Fitz noticed, flighty, leaving early, not showing up for Team Meetings, unusually snappy. Whenever he tried to talk to her, she seemed too far away to actually reach. 

“Where’s Daisy?” Fitz asked Ward at training one day, noticing her missing for the second day in a row. That was not like Daisy at all. 

“She’s not feeling well,” Ward replied. “Focus.”

Fitz threw up his hands just in time to block Bobbi’s attack. 

“Good job,” Hunter said from the side of the mat where he was coaching. “Good block, Fitz.”

“Are you sure she’s okay, though?” Fitz asked.

“She’s fine. She just needed a few days off,” Ward said. 

“That’s not – Ward, is she  _ okay _ ?”

Bobbi stopped swinging and looked between Fitz and Ward. 

“She told me to fuck off,” Ward finally said with a bit of a growl to his voice.  “So, probably not.”

Fitz had promised Daisy that he’d help her, that he’d watch after her and help her control her powers. He wasn’t sure if this counted to their agreement, but he also wasn’t going to let his friend suffer to keep some arbitrary agreement.  He could do both, watch out for her powers and her well-being.

He stepped away from the sparring mat with Bobbi, everyone’s concern at his behavior tangling in his gut.

“Sorry, I’ve – I’ve got to go. I’ve just got a sense.”

And he left, speed-walking. He’d teleport to her bunk if he thought it wouldn’t exhaust himself immediately. About halfway to her bunk, the entire compound began to tremor with an earthquake.

“Daisy,” he whispered and focused on his surroundings, willing himself to feel her nearby. Panic and fear radiated furthest, strongest, tingled in the back of his mind for longer. He found her in the lounge, her anxiety choking, and he let his power take him to her. 

It felt like he was condensed into a small sphere and then yanked out again to be the proper size, all in an instant, cold and hot running through him in tandem. 

When he landed, he had to take a minute to reorient himself, turning to find her. She was crouched in the corner of the lounge near the chess table, glass shards surrounding her on the ground. She was gripping her arms, and he could see bruises starting to bloom up her skin. He stepped over the shards and knelt down in front of her, ignoring the way they bit into his knees.

“Hey,” Fitz said softly. 

“You shouldn’t be here,” she whimpered. “You should go.”

“Sorry, love, I definitely can’t do that. I made you a promise, remember.”

Tears dripped down her cheeks as he reached out, and she pulled away. 

“I’m going to hurt you.”

“You can’t, I’m definitely un- hurtable .”

She put her hands up, hands trembling, as if to block him from getting hurt.

“What’s wrong, Daisy?”

“I don’t know.”

“Walk me through the past couple of days, then, whenever this feeling started.”

“I don’t know. It’s been pretty quiet recently, you know. I haven’t had any slips, nothing like this. You know, you’ve been here. I’ve been doing really good, everything has been great, but today, okay, well, no. It started about three days ago after I talked to my dad,” she said. The entire compound shook again, harder and a glass fell off the counter behind Fitz somewhere, and she flinched, the panic spike came again sharp in the base of his skull like an ice pick. He didn’t care what broke, only that she was okay. 

“Hey, don’t focus on that. We’ll stop the quakes, just talk to me.”

“I can’t,” she gasped out.

He cautiously reached out again, and she didn’t draw away. When he took her hands, the quakes around them faded out, but he felt them rocking through him instead. 

“Okay, see, quakes are gone. Talk to me.”

“Well, I talked to my dad, but he got cut off because someone found them, and I heard gunshots, and now he’s not picking up, neither him or Mom. I’m worried something happened to them, and I just got them back. I can’t lose them already.”

He clenched his jaw to keep from groaning as she let another wave lose, taking it.

“We work for SHIELD, we can find them,” he replied. “We can head straight to the computer and start a search for them. We’ll find them.”

“What if they’re nowhere to find?”

“Then, we’ll deal with that if that happens, but your parents, they’ve made it this far and this long being followed and tracked. They’re not going to give up and take it laying down now that they’ve got you back either.”

“You don’t know that.”

“If I were your dad,” Fitz said, and she laughed quietly at that, “I’d never let you out of my sight or stop fighting to get back to you.”

“Daisy!”  Ward called, ducking into the lounge and spotting them. “Oh! There you are.”

“Fitz?” Simmons followed.

“We’re okay,” Fitz said, but he felt his voice shake. Daisy gripped his hands as another blast of quakes shocked through him. “We’re okay,  Daise . We just need to breathe. Right. We’re in control of our powers, our powers don’t control us.”

He watched as Daisy took a deep breath in as they’d all been taught.

“Fitz,” Simmons gasped, and she appeared at his side , carefully avoiding the glass he was knelt in . “Let go.”

He looked down at his arms, matching bruises starting to bloom across his skin as they had Daisy’s. He could feel the bones in his arms and shoulders starting to crack, little fractures bursting through them. It felt like his entire being was breaking, and he was glad that he and Daisy were on the same side. 

“It’s fine. I’m fine.”

“You’re  _ not _ ,” she hissed. 

Daisy looked down, and frowned.

“How are you doing that?” she asked, and the quaking stopped , a peak of curiosity shining through her  cloud of anxiety . “How are you holding on?”

“I’ve been through worse, Daisy,” he said, and his voice cracked. “This is nothing. The,  uhh , the institution used to test on us for all types of horrific things, and I learned to endure anything. And for you, for any of you, if you need me, I will endure anything to help you.”

She threw a hug around him, and the quakes stopped entirely as he wrapped her in his arms, the two of them tucked into each other, still and free. 

“That was so stupid,” she said.

“I know.”

“Don’t do it again.”

“I won’t.”

She rested in his arms for a moment longer before saying, “you really think they’re okay?”

“I do.”

“Okay.”

She sat back.

“You should get these looked at,” she said, taking his wrists gingerly in her grasp.

“It’s fine,” he said. “I’ll heal.”

“Is everyone okay?” Coulson said, stepping into the lounge followed by May, Hunter, and Bobbi. Fitz helped Daisy stand and step over the broken glass to safer footing, even though he knew his own knees were destroyed by the glass shards. Those would heal, too. He brushed the glass from the front of his pants and onto the ground, not for the first time wishing that one of his powers would be useful in clean ups. “Daisy? Fitz?”

They wore matching bruises on their arms, and both looked a little worse for wear, but when Fitz looked at Daisy, she smiled for the first time in days. It wasn’t anything big, but it was there, just enough to show that she was okay, or she was getting there. He’d take her to the computer set up in the control room later, and they’d blaze through a plan to locate her parents or  at least some trace that they were alive. It would be okay.

“We’re okay,” Daisy said. 

“We’re okay,” he agreed.

“You should really get those looked at,” she said as Hunter crossed the lounge to stand by Simmons, staring at Fitz’s marked up arms. “That can’t be good for you.”

“I’ll tell you a little secret,” he said, and focused on the last little bit of energy he had, his adrenaline fading, and pushed it through one arm from his elbow down, and the bruises faded easily. “I’m told you that I’m un- hurtable , remember.”

“Show off,” Simmons muttered with a roll of her eyes. “Honestly, Fitz.”

He shrugged. 

“The rest will heal over the next hour, probably.”

Hunter reached out and touched his now unmarked arm with careful finger tips. Fitz flexed his fingers, curling and stretching them to show that his bones were fine. From the elbow down, they were fine at least. The rest of his body ached like he’d been thrown in front of a train, but he didn’t mention that.

“I do need a nap now, so it’s not really a brag if you immediately have to sleep for an hour,” Fitz said. Hunter  offered his arm to escort him , which Fitz took and leaned into him. “You’ll be okay,  Daise ?”

Ward took over looking after Daisy, and she nodded at Fitz to send him off.

“So,” Hunter said as they walked from the lounge to the  sleeping quarters. “That was a monumentally stupid idea.”

Fitz laughed and nodded his agreement.

“There,  uhm , there was this girl in the institution, her name was Aubrey, she was a lot like Daisy. She couldn’t control her powers, and she would get sent to the hole if she couldn’t get them back in control on her own.”

Hunter was quiet.

“I was barely ten years old when I was left at the institution, early bloomer and all, but Aubrey had Manifested at six and had been there for years before we met, an orphan left for the institution to raise. I made a promise to her that I would help her, try and keep her from having to go into the hole. But I barely had control over my own power, let alone knew how to help someone else. One day, she got upset over a game that we’d been playing, and she blew up. She was telekinetic, so she threw the game pieces everywhere and ripped shelves off the wall and books from people’s hands. I tried calming her down, but I couldn’t. I didn’t know how. Her panic made me panic, and I lost control myself. I was thrown in the hole for isolation for three weeks, and when I came out, no one had seen Aubrey since that day.”

Hunter hissed out a breath and Fitz paused.

“ Daisy asked me to help her find that control, and I agreed because I know how terrifying it is to have all of this power barely constrained inside of you. So, if I can help her settle down, even if that means  taking her power until she can, I will.”

“But you can’t help someone else at the expense of your own safety.”

“I can,” Fitz argued. 

Hunter kissed his temple and sighed.

“Just don’t scare me like that, okay. I saw those bruises and thought I was going to lose you, that you were going to tear yourself apart.”

Fitz tilted his head back and kissed Hunter gently. 

“You can’t get rid of me that easily.”

“It would have been nice to know earlier that you have healing powers, though.”

“Just for myself, and it’s just a natural expedited healing factor. Sometimes I can speed up a single area of healing like with before but it’s still a relatively new power so I have to sleep afterwards.”

“ Which one is this one then?”

“Eleven,” Fitz said.  “It would have come in handy more in the institution, but my body waited until I was safe in the lab to Manifest that one.”

They reached Fitz's bunk which he let them into, and  Hunter followed him to the edge of the bed , which Fitz fell into gracelessly. His body ached, but the mattress was a welcome  relief underneath him. He looked up, making eye contact with Hunter who l inger ed away from the mattress. 

“Get on the bed, Hunter.”

“We’ve never done anything so I didn’t want to assume,” Hunter replied , kicking off his shoes.

“I appreciate that,” Fitz replied, but pat the bed beside him. It wasn’t a super large bed, certainly not designed for two adult people but he was certainly willing to try. "We have made out in dark corners, though, and this is absolutely no different.”

He watched Hunter throw off his jacket towards his desk chair.

“It’s a little different,” Hunter argued, kneeling on the edge of the bed. “There’s a bed involved.”

“True.”

“You’re horizontal,” Hunter continued. 

“Also, true.”

Hunter carefully laid down next to him and kissed him without touching him.

“I’m not going to break if you put your hands on me,” Fitz said. 

“You’re covered in bruises, love,” he said. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

Fitz turned on his side to give Hunter a bit more room on the mattress and put his hand on Hunter’s chest.

“I’m hurt, yes, but I’m not broken. I’m already on the mend. The world is going to have to try a lot harder to break me.”

Hunter laughed, and shuffled closer to Fitz to kiss him a little harder, hand coming up to hold Fitz’s jaw.

“Better?” Hunter asked. “Is this what you wanted?”

Fitz slid his hands down to Hunter’s hips and tugged him a little closer so their chests were touching. 

“Better.”

He yawned, and laughed out a sorry.

“Take a nap, Fitz,” Hunter muttered, pressing a kiss onto his forehead. “We can do anything we want later. You just need to sleep now; I’ll be there with you.”

When Fitz fell asleep, it was tucked into Hunter’s chest, his body aching but healing. 


	2. Chapter 2

It was another week before Coulson came to them with a mission.

“We got a heads up from headquarters that a girl in DC Manifested in the middle of her church this morning,” he said after everyone had gathered in the situation room. Fitz took a hissed in breath. “Her name is Abigail Templeton, she’s twelve years old, she’s gone missing or has run away.”

“We need to get to her first,” May said as if that wasn’t obvious. 

“Is there any evidence that she was taken already?” Fitz asked softly, heartrate jack rabbiting. His own first Manifestation flashed through him, terror still fresh as his dad loaded him onto a plane and dragged him across the ocean to that terrible place. He couldn’t wish that on anyone, especially not a little girl who never asked for this. 

“No,” Coulson said. “There’s video surveillance of Abigail slipping away into an abandoned train station an hour ago, alone. We go in, we get the girl, and we transport her to our safe facility for care and possible rehoming.” 

Fitz and Simmons were sent out with Daisy and Ward, while Bobbi and Hunter went with Mack and Yo-Yo, following leads through the outskirts of Washington DC.

“You know how to use this, right?” Ward asked as he passed a pistol to Fitz.

“Yes, I know how to use a gun,” Fitz said.

“You didn’t know how to throw a punch a few weeks ago. Forgive me for doubting your ability to hold and handle a deadly weapon.”

But Fitz holstered the weapon.

“You know I don’t really need this, though, right?” Fitz asked. Ward shrugged.

“Not my call. Talk to Coulson about that. He wanted everyone fully stocked and prepared for anything.”

“This feels overdramatic,” Fitz said to Simmons as they put on bulletproof vests under their jackets. 

“If you get shot, you’ll be thankful for that,” Simmons said.

“Oh, no, a bullet,” Fitz muttered. “Something my twelve abilities can’t counter.”

“Fitz.”

She said it like a scolding, but the way that only Jemma Simmons could, gentle even as it stung, like a vaccine injection to keep you safe. 

“Right, I know,” he said. “I’m just nervous.”

She stepped up and ran her hands over Fitz’s arms soothingly. 

“You can handle this. You’ve got all of the tools, and me at your side. Nothing will happen, because you’re in control.”

“I am.”

“Good, come on, you know you want to prove Ward wrong.”

It was simple enough, searching through first the train yard. 

“She’s gone,” Ward said over the comms to Coulson. “She’s not here. Any sign of her on surveillance since?”

“Nothing,” Coulson confirmed.

“What were her abilities again?” Simmons asked. 

“Magnetic manipulation,” Fitz replied. 

“Not invisibility, then.”

“Not exactly.”

Fitz felt a tickle at the back of his head, a faint awareness he couldn’t quite describe.

“Mack and Yo-Yo think they’ve got a lead,” Daisy said. “We should head their way.”

“Wait,” Fitz said, turning towards the feeling. “I don’t think we should go yet.”

“And why not?” Ward asked. “We’ve been over this place and there’s no sign of her still here.”

“If I say I have a feeling, you’re going to laugh, but it’s a feeling.”

He extended that sense, his empathy stretching out, touching Ward’s impatience and Simmons’ happy pride, and there, just beyond where they could see, a quiet, all-encompassing fear that radiated from a small closet at the back of the building.

“Someone’s still here,” he said, heading towards that closet without waiting. There was a large metal sheet pulled in front of the door, which Fitz figured someone with magnetic manipulation would be able to do without a problem. “I think she’s in here.”

With Ward’s help, they were able to pull the sheet from the door and Daisy opened the door slowly. When they found Abigail, she was curled up into a small ball at the back of the closer, her head tucked under her arms.

“Hey,” Daisy said softly, sinking down to a crouch without stepping into the doorway. “Are you Abigail?”

The girl peaked out from her arms, tears dripping down her cheeks.

Fitz couldn’t help the way his heart squeezed. He remembered feeling that scared, the freshly Manifested power hot inside of him with no way to control it. People who had never Manifested didn’t understand what that felt like, even some Handlers didn’t understand it. It was like being handed a lit match when you were already doused in gasoline, a spark that could destroy you so easily that you had close to no control over. The fact that people feared and hated the Manifested meant that at the moment of Manifestation, something no one can possibly help or predict, you became a target when you were already scared. 

The first Manifested must have been terrified.

“Yeah,” Abigail answered, voice a weak whimper of a sound.

“I’m Daisy, I’m with SHIELD. We’re here to help you.”

Abigail looked up at them all, eyes tracking from Daisy to Simmons and Fitz behind her, and further back, Ward. 

“I could hurt you,” the girl murmured. 

“Can I tell you a secret?” Daisy asked, holding up her hand palm to the sky, and she let out a tiny burst of energy. “I’m just like you. And Fitz over there, he’s just like you, too.”

Fitz let fire dance across his fingertips as he waved at her.

“You are?” 

“We are.”

“And you’re here to save me?”

Daisy nodded. 

“We’re going to get you out of here, and get you some place safe.”

Slowly, the girl unfolded herself and let them lead her out of the train yard. Daisy radioed the other group to let them know, but got no reply.

“That’s not  _ good _ ,” Ward said slowly. “Fitz, Simmons, why don’t you and I head for their last known location, and see what’s going on? Daisy, escort the girl back to the Bus.”

“Are you sure that’s for the best?” Daisy asked.

“You’ve been on missions in the field before,” he said. “I trust you. Time for Fitzsimmons to get their feet a little wet.”

Fitz and Simmons exchanged a look, but nodded as Daisy did. Ward was the senior officer here, technically.

“You’re going to be okay,” Fitz said to Abigail. “Daisy is the best, and she’s going to get you somewhere safe, where no one’s going to hurt you.”

She looked down at his hand where he’d produced the flames earlier.

“Promise?”

“I promise,” he said. 

She nodded and stepped closer to Daisy. Simmons nudged him as he started to follow her and Ward towards the other half of the train yard, and made a face.

“That was very good, Fitz. You were so good with her.”

“I remember being in her position, young and scared and wanting reassurance.”

“This is why Coulson and May formed this team,” Simmons said, “for your perspective, for the human element of understanding what they’re going through.”

He nodded.

“Yeah, I just didn’t expect the first case to be this, this  _ familiar _ , you know?”

Simmons was one of the only people who knew everything, knew about the institution and what they’d done to Fitz, who knew everything that still haunted him. She’d stayed awake for hours late into the night listening to his worries and fears, soothing him, and letting him talk himself down. If anyone understood why this resonated, it was her. 

“I know.”

“Be on your guard,” Ward said. “We don’t know what we’re walking into.”

Fitz felt the begging at the back of his throat, asking for the right to lash out at anything. He was nervous, and his powers felt it, anxious themselves in response. That was something he really should have anticipated, that his anxiety might affect how his abilities reacted. He’d have to talk to Simmons about that, maybe work on calming techniques. 

“Yes, sir,” Fitz said. 

They followed, careful but quick.

“Anybody there?” Ward radioed again. There was a crackle, but no response from anyone. “Coulson, what’s their last exact position?”

“Sending coordinates to guide you right to them.” 

“On our way.”

Ward led the way following the coordinates, around the train yard and down the block to the updated and somehow still abandoned train station. Fitz’s heart pounded, concerned for everyone’s safety, but more acutely Hunter’s. 

The begging came back, stronger, harder, more insistent. He swallowed it down and ignored it, but he really wanted to let it go. He wouldn’t have to worry with that power, that thing in control. That was the opposite of a helpful thought, of course. There was no way he could ever let that thing out intentionally. When even Simmons was afraid of it, there was no way anyone else would understand. It was too dark, too hungry, too unending. Reining it in was like trying to catch smoke in a jar. 

The train station itself had been evacuated after a Manifested flare a few years earlier, and had never reopened. The flooring had been cracked and from what Fitz remembered from the briefing, the foundation had been severely damaged as well. The station itself was gorgeous, all stone pillars and high ceilings, natural light flooding through windows that longed for a cleaning. As soon as they crossed into the station proper, Fitz could see the rest of their team grouped by the ticket counter. 

Mack looked up at their approach.

“What’s going on?” he asked. 

“You weren’t answering comms,” Ward replied. “We found the girl. Everything okay?”

“We also found the girl,” Mack answered, gesturing to a girl who looked identical to Abigail. Except... 

Fitz frowned, and caught Simmons’ sleeve as she stepped forward after Ward. 

“That’s not Abigail,” Fitz said, and Ward stopped in his tracks. 

“What do you mean?”

The girl didn’t give off an emotion, not the way everyone else did. Where she should be radiating some emotion – fear, relief, concern, anything – there was a void. 

“She’s not – I don’t think she’s real.”

He reached out with a different power, a needle that sat at the base of his skull, rarely used but patient nonetheless. When he tried to pierce her mind, it came back like an echo thrumming through the connection.

“I don’t know what she is, but she’s not real,” he said, mostly to Simmons.

The girl reached her hand out towards Fitz, and the scared expression turned wicked into a cold smile.

“You passed this test,” a voice not entirely earthly said, the girl’s mouth moving but slightly off-sync. “Next time won’t be so easy.”

And then, the girl was simply gone. 

“What the fuck? How’d you know?” Ward asked. 

“If I say I had a feeling,” Fitz replied with a shrug. 

“What do you think they  meant, _ you passed this test _ ?” Simmons asked. 

“It was ominous, whatever it was,” Fitz said. “When I reached out with a power, it couldn’t find anyone.”

Simmons hummed.

“That’s certainly concerning,” she said.

They finished crossing the station.

“Where’d you find her?” Ward asked.

“She was wandering around that park next door, looking dazed as if she didn’t know where she was,” Mack replied. “We hadn’t heard from you so we assumed that this was her.”

“How sure are you that the girl with Daisy is the real Abigail?” Ward asked, turning to Fitz.

“One hundred percent. She was terrified in that closet, and it was hidden by a metal sheet. She wasn’t trying to set a trap for us, she was genuinely scared and was trying to hide until she was safe,” Fitz replied. “If I thought someone was after me like that, I’d find a place no one would find me, and just stay still until they’d forgotten me.”

“Not the soundest plan,” Ward said. 

“Fear is rarely logical, unfortunately, Agent Ward.”

* * *

Back on the plane, heading back to base, Ward caught his elbow before he went back to the lab. 

“Hey, I wanted to talk to you,” Ward said.

“Are you about to yell at me? Did I fuck up?”

“No, actually. I wanted to say that it was a good catch, knowing where Abigail was, and that the other girl was fake. You’re a valuable asset to the team, and I apologize for doubting that, for doubting you. Coulson and May chose you for this team for good reason. I’m glad to have you out there with me.”

“Wow, Ward,” Fitz said softly, and playfully punched Ward in the shoulder. It was like punching a brick wall, and he shook his hand out. It wouldn’t hurt for long, at least. “You  ol ’ softie.”

Ward rolled his eyes. 

“Alright, you’re free to go. Go do nerd things in the lab or whatever it is you do in your spare time.”

“Thank you, Ward. I won’t tell anyone you have feelings.”

* * *

“You were amazing,” Hunter said, stepping into the lab after Fitz back at the base. He stopped beside Fitz at the lab and leaned into him. “I know you’re not super confident as an agent. But you were bloody brilliant out there. I’m so proud of you.”

“Thanks,” Fitz said. 

“You’re working after all you did today, though? Are you always this much of a workaholic, love?”

“I have to run some samples I asked Abigail for.”

“You’re testing on Abigail?”

“No, nothing like that. It’s just that she got metal underneath her fingernails somehow. She said she didn’t remember how it got there, since she doesn’t have to touch metal to move it.”

He shrugged.

“I don’t know if it’s related to her Manifestation or not, and Simmons is always on the hunt for more information about the actual moment of Manifestation, you know? She’s been present for a couple of  mine , but since they’re not predictable, it’s not like she’s had monitors on me for them. She would love that, actually.”

He messed with the solution for the sample but stopped before he applied any. 

“Simmons is the only person I would trust to monitor me like that, though, after – after what happened to me before.”

Hunter nodded but then stopped. He didn’t want to push Fitz, but it was hard not to ask after what he’d heard and seen already.

“I don’t know if I actually know what happened,” he said. “Not that you’re required to tell me. You don’t owe me anything.”

Fitz looked at Hunter, and seemed to consider him for a moment. 

“It’s not a good story,” he warned. 

“I suspected it might not be,” Hunter replied. “I saw the memory of the institution the day we met. I’ve heard the horror stories.”

Fitz nodded. 

“The institution was obviously anti-Manifested. The only reason we were locked in there was because of our Manifestation. The entire time I was there, there was no resident that hadn’t Manifested, you know, and there wasn’t an employee that had. We were kept in our rooms except for at meal times, or social times where we were expected to learn to be quote-unquote normal. We were broken up into sections, and each section of the institution was under the, well, I hesitate to call it  _ care _ but under the watch of a science division. I was in the section of the institution testing inhibitors,” Fitz said. 

Hunter frowned. He couldn’t imagine being so anti-anything that he’d experiment and torture them.

“They’d have us test our powers, and then they’d inject us with whatever serum they’d cooked up recently, and then they’d have us test our powers again. Sometimes, they’d work, sometimes, they wouldn’t. I was never more grateful than when it worked. They’d let me go back to my room and sleep it off. If it didn’t, they’d try different doses, different combinations.”

Fitz rolled up his sleeve and held his arm out for Hunter to examine. Hunter did so carefully, cradling his forearm in one hand and running his fingers over the skin until he found the series of scars at the crook of his elbow.

“What are these from?” Hunter asked.

“From the repeated injections and IVs. I don’t have a lot of scars, especially since Manifesting my regenerative healing ability, but these ones,” he said softly, stopping as Hunter kissed them softly. He wanted Fitz to know he was safe now, that he wouldn’t let anything happen to him. “I don’t know if I’d want them to heal over anyway.”

“ Why’s that?”

“They’re proof that something wretched and evil tried to change me, tried to  _ fix _ me, and I refused, I survived.”

Fitz lit a small fire in the palm of his hand and Hunter looked at it, marveling at the way it danced and breathed against Fitz’s skin without harming him, the way it seemed to live, a piece of him.

“I don’t need fixing, no matter what they think.”

“That’s true,” Hunter said. He tugged Fitz closer so their chests were touching. “You are perfect.”

“Hunter,” Fitz started just as Hunter kissed him, and Fitz didn't continue his thought. 

“The team’s having a celebration for our first successful mission if you wanted to come  join and stop being such a workaholic.”

“You started this relationship with me knowing I’m a workaholic, to be fair.”

He kissed Fitz’s jaw and nibbled on his ear. 

“Thank you for telling me about what happened to you,” Hunter muttered. “Will you come to the celebration in the lounge? Relax?”

“Let me get this in the analyzer,” Fitz said, gripping the front of Hunter’s shirt. “And then we can go.”

Hunter slipped around to stand behind him, his front pressed along Fitz’s back, his arms around his waist. He loved how Fitz fit against him.

“What are you doing?”

“Helping.”

“That’s not what I would consider helping.”

“You just need to broaden your horizons, love.” 

Fitz hummed but let Hunter hold him close while he worked. He was clearly trying to ignore the soft kisses against his neck and shoulder. Hunter held him close like that could convince Fitz that he mattered, that he hadn’t been broken by the institution. He was whole and good and wonderful, and Hunter wanted to convince him of that. 

Once Fitz got the sample into the machine for analysis, Hunter started backing away with him still in his arms, heading for the door. 

“Hunter,” he laughed.

“Come on, love. To the lounge.”

Fitz went quiet for a moment, body still, and Hunter was afraid he’d overstepped a boundary, but then Fitz said into the quiet of the lab, “okay, hold on, baby.”

Then, it felt like Hunter was being stretched and compressed all at once, all of the breath leaving his body, his heart stalling in his chest. They landed with a  _ whoosh _ of air, and Hunter instinctually sucked in a breath. They were in the lounge where the team was setting up the after-mission celebration, just inside the doorway.

“Don’t  _ do that _ ,” he hissed.

“Fitz!” Simmons called, waving from the counter where she was setting up a chip and dip tray. “Did you teleport here?”

“Yeah,” he replied. 

“With absolutely no fucking warning, I’ll add,” Hunter said, “Mister I Need A Nap.” 

“I’m fine,” Fitz said. Hunter let his waist go. “Go get a beer and calm down.”

“Calm down?” Hunter laughed at his boyfriend’s cheekiness, and he attacked Fitz’s neck with tickles as he said, “I’ll show you  _ calm _ .”

* * *

The next mission went smoother, no comms dropped and no creepy not-target giving them tests, and they brought the Manifested in safely. He was a 16-year-old boy named Tim who had been on the run for a year after he’d accidentally crushed his parents’ van into a metal ball the size of a football. Fitz still wasn’t psyched about going out in the field, but Hunter always smiled that smile at him, and Simmons praised how well he kept his powers in check especially when there was danger. It was hard to hate the field with all things considered.

He still hated training. Even training with Hunter which often devolved into running their hands over each other and making out up against gym equipment. Those parts were amazing. The parts where they actually trained were terrible.

But he was determined not to be a nuisance or a liability to the team. 

He learned to fight, to shoot, to use his powers like the weapons they were. He and Daisy had separate sessions where he walked her through some of his own hard-won techniques for control. 

“Okay, let’s try sparring, I guess. Just don’t kick my ass, please,” Fitz said one afternoon, already sweaty, his t-shirt sticking to him. 

“Like you don’t heal,” Daisy scoffed.

“Doesn’t meant it doesn’t hurt, you know,” Fitz replied.

“You’re so delicate.”

They settled on the mat facing each other, and Daisy bounced around eagerly. 

“Those braces we were talking about,” Daisy said, “where are you and Simmons on those?”

“They’re mostly Simmons, so you’d have to ask her.”

Daisy grinned.

“Gladly,” she said, and lunged towards him with a quake punch. He dodged it and flung a fireball at her. She hit the fireball with a quake burst that snuffed out the fireball. Some of his powers weren’t particularly offensive, and if they were, he wasn’t comfortable using them in a sparring fight with Daisy. 

“That was good,” he said. 

“Thanks. Come get me.”

He grinned, wiggled his eyebrows at her, and then let the shroud of his invisibility sweep over him.

“Unfair,” she said, falling back into a defensive position immediately.

“Do what you  gotta do,” Fitz replied, and then moved away as Daisy sent a quake at where his voice had come from. “Ooh, miss.”

“Don’t Battleship me,” she said. He snuck quietly around her and switched his voice to hers.

“You sunk my Battleship.”

She spun and quaked him, just as he ducked and threw himself underneath it. 

“You’re a little shit,” she accused.

“Always.”

Daisy swatted at the air in front of her in hope of hitting Fitz. He stood and crept around her. He tapped her shoulder a couple times and went to dodge away, but she spun around and grabbed his wrist before he could get out of her melee range. She quaked him and knocked him backwards, his invisibility breaking and he landed hard on his back.

“Ow,” he groaned. 

“You deserved that.”

“That’s super rude,” he said. She came over and held out her hand to him. He reached out and grabbed it just as he let a small flame singe her palm a little.

“Motherfucker,” she hissed, pulling her hand away. “What the fuck, Leopold?”

He let a small amount of energy take him across the room as she went to quake him back in retaliation. 

“God, I hate how many powers you have,” she said, laughing. He’d never had this before, playful fights using powers openly.

“Hey, listen,  Manifest some more and we’ll see how you do still.”

“Maybe you should un-Manifest some,” Daisy teased. 

“Would if I could.”

“Alright, let’s try this again. No teleporting.”

* * *

Hunter worried. He pretended like he didn’t, but every time they went out in the field, he worried about the team. Bobbi was more than capable of handling herself, but he couldn’t help worrying that something might set her off and she’d flare, and they’d have to be pulled from the team. He hated that idea, that Bobbi  would be put on desk duty because he wasn’t good at being a handler. They never should have chosen him. 

“Bob,” Hunter said, gesturing towards the girl they were trying to sneak out of the school. 

“Alright, alright,” Bobbi said. She rolled her shoulders and smiled at the girl. She was fifteen, and terrified. “My name is Bobbi; I’m going to pretend to be you so we can get you outside and someplace safe away from those bad men.”

“You can do that?”

“Yeah, I’m a Manifested just like you. My power is that I can take people’s forms, like this.”

Bobbi’s form shifted, her shoulders slimming and her legs shrinking. Her long blonde locks darkened and curled into the girl’s textured black until she was a  fifteen year old black girl in a school uniform. 

“Fitz,” Bobbi said into the comms, “are you ready?”

“I am,” he replied. “Can you have her speak into the comms for me first?”

Hunter passed his comm to Rhea who wiped it off before pushing it into her ear.

“Hello?” she said. “ Uhh , yeah, I can do that. My name is Rhea. I would really like to get out of this place, if you could. Does that work?”

She nodded, and took out the comm, handing it over to Hunter. 

“He’s got a nice voice,” she said.

“He does,” Hunter agreed. 

“I heard that,” Fitz said. 

“Good. It’s true.”

“Could you two not flirt on mission?” Daisy asked. “We get it, you’re cute and want to bone each other. Just do it already.”

“Maybe not on mission, though,” Mack added.

“Definitely not while on mission,” May stated. 

“Okay, ready to go,” Bobbi said, adjusting her skirt. “Daisy, where is that patrol?”

“Close enough. Fitz, you’re up.”

“I’m going to turn my comm off so I don’t blow your ear drums,” Fitz said. 

“Be safe,” Daisy said. 

“Always,” he said. Then he went quiet, and then Hunter heard a shout from across the building, exactly like Rhea’s voice. Hunter sighed.

“Okay, good to go, Bobbi,” Daisy said. “Head on out.”

Bobbi stepped out of the closet they were hiding in. Hunter kept himself in front of Rhea just in case anyone was outside. 

“Be careful, Bob,” he said.

“Always,” she said, mimicking Fitz. “See you on the other side.”

Then Bobbi stepped out and left them in the closet. A beat passed as her footfalls receded.

“Okay, Hunter, take Rhea out the back and meet up with Yo-Yo and Mack,” Daisy said. “I’ll track you to make sure to the coast is clear.”

“Come on, time to go,” Hunter said, stepping out into the hall, gesturing Rhea after him. She took his hand, and he smiled at her to try and reassure her. 

“Is he your boyfriend?” Rhea asked quietly. 

“Yes,” he answered.

“Is he cute?”

“Yes,” he replied. She looked him over obviously, and nodded like that confirmed something to him. 

“Cool,” Rhea said. 

Hunter followed the path they’d mapped out before, keeping Rhea near as they ducked around corners.

“Oh, hold up,” Daisy said. Hunter reached out and touched Rhea’s arm to hold her in place behind him. “Empty classroom to your right, Hunter.”

He swung them around and into the classroom.

“Wait up,” Hunter said. 

“Hunter, are you still with Rhea?” Fitz asked.

“Yeah, she’s right here,” he replied.

“Okay. Keep an eye on her, I just saw one of those look-a-likes.”

“Yeah, that’s Bobbi.”

“No, no, like the first one we saw, like a void.”

“Oh. I’ve got her, then. Just keep away from that void person, alright?”

“Not a problem,” Fitz replied. “Ooh, it saw me.”

“There’s an emergency exit nearby,” Daisy said. “Duck out and head towards the back. Meet up with Mack and Yo-Yo there.”

“Copy that.”

“Hunter, you’re in the clear, they’re headed out of the path.”

“Thanks, Daise. Let’s go, Rhea.”

Hunter, Rhea’s hand in his, headed out into the hallway and back onto the path out. Finally, they stepped out into the sunset, and were met with Mack, Yo-Yo, and Fitz at the van they’d parked in the loading dock. 

“Where’s Bobbi?” Rhea asked.

“Meeting us around the corner,” Hunter said. “Don’t worry. In you get, love.”

He helped her into the van and climbed up after her. Mack and Yo-Yo started up the van as Fitz loaded on and pulled the door shut. He kissed Hunter’s cheek quickly which made Hunter grin. 

Hunter turned as they started driving away, and saw Rhea standing behind the van. 

“Is that the void?” Hunter asked. Fitz and Rhea turned at the same time and Rhea made a noise in the back of her throat. 

“Yeah,” Fitz said after a moment. “I don’t like that thing. Please drive faster, Yo-Yo.”

They picked Bobbi up, who had turned back into herself, at the corner, and drove to the Bus parked on the edge of town. 

“You okay?” Bobbi asked Rhea.

“Yeah, that was cool,” Rhea said, “terrifying but cool.”

“And we’re going to get you some place safe,” Bobbi said. “Plus, you’ll get to see the really cool, super spy plane that Fitz designed.”

“Are you the boyfriend, then?” Rhea asked, turning to Fitz. 

“I am,” he agreed. She looked him over, and then looked at Hunter with an impressed nod. 

“I like him. Good job.”

Hunter chuckled.

“Yeah, you know what, I like him, too,” Hunter said, nudging Rhea gently. She laughed, her laugh a sweet, child-like sound, and Hunter was reminded just how young this girl was, how important their job was. He could worry, but at the end of the day, they had to be here to keep doing this, to keep protecting boys and girls like Rhea, like who Fitz needed when he was a kid.

* * *

Hunter had this way of turning Fitz on without touching him. There was a look he got in his eyes, and the way he radiated affection and arousal, it was too much. The fact that Fitz had to behave on base and not touch Hunter when he was supposed to be training, or listening to Coulson talk about a mission, it was all so criminal. 

One day, though, Hunter caught him by the arm on the way out of the meeting they’d had to attend.

“Hey,” he said. “Are you done for the day, too?”

Fitz nodded, and breathed in the heavy, pleasant feeling of Hunter’s impatient arousal. 

“Will you come back to my bunk, then?”

“Yeah,” Fitz replied immediately. “Yes.”

Hunter’s hand slid down from his elbow to his hand, sliding their fingers together, and he led Fitz away from the rest of the team. As soon as they were in the bunk, the door closing behind them, sealing them away from the rest of the team, Hunter’s hands found Fitz’s hips, turning him around to face him. Their mouths met, hard and hot and Fitz couldn’t stop himself from gasping into it. 

“I’ve been waiting  _ all day _ to get you alone, Fitz,” he murmured into Fitz’s mouth, nipping at his lower lip and sucking at it. “You’ve been driving me crazy.”

“I know, you’re really,  _ really _ loud about it.”

“Loud?”

“You know how I mentioned that I’m an empath? I know when you’re turned on.”

“Oh. So, you know,” Hunter said, trailing off.

“That you like me a lot? And spend a lot of your day staring at my ass? Yes. I do.”

“Good.”

And Hunter went back to kissing him, their bodies matched up perfectly. Never had he kissed someone like this. They’d kissed before, mostly in public on their way back to the bunks, trying to keep their hands to themselves, but this was different. They were alone. The door was closed. There was nothing keeping them from rubbing up against each other until there was no going back. He didn’t want to stop.

_ God _ , he didn’t want to stop. Ever.

He wanted Hunter’s hands all over him, and luckily, Hunter seemed eager to provide. Hunter’s hands were a steady heat where they held Fitz’s hips, tongue sliding against his own, and then, and then, beautiful Lance Hunter shifted, his leg sliding between Fitz’s, right against his aching cock with just enough pressure. A small, surprised and delighted moan slipped from him into Hunter’s mouth, which only seemed to egg him on, his hands tugging Fitz closer.

Something delicate inside of him snapped in a way he wasn’t unaccustomed to at this point, a swell of power rising from deep in his belly, and Hunter went flying back into the wall behind him with the force of it.

“What the fuck,” Hunter hissed, reaching up to rub the back of his head where it had impacted. “Did you just shove me?”

“I’m sorry, I don’t know what happened,” Fitz said, reaching out towards Hunter, and there, he felt it. He felt his reach extended in a way he couldn’t explain, the same way he couldn’t explain the rest of his abilities and how he knew which one to reach for and where each one sat inside of him. 

“Your eyes,” Hunter said, looking straight into Fitz’s eyes. “They’re glowing. Did you just  _ Manifest  _ again?”

“I think so.”

Hunter’s hands came up experimentally to touch Fitz’s face again, cradling his jaw, thumbs stroking over his burning hot skin. It had been a while since Fitz had manifested another ability, but he always burned hot when it happened.

“I’m so good at this that I made you more magical, huh,” he joked, and rested his forehead against Fitz’s. Fitz clutched onto the front of Hunter’s shirt, hands shaking. More seriously, he muttered, “that’s thirteen, then?”

“It is.”

“Lucky number thirteen. Let’s see what else I can make happen without touching you, love.”

Hunter backed him up to the bed without letting him go.

“Is this okay?” he asked as Fitz let him lay them out of the mattress, Hunter pressed deliciously along his body. Hunter felt like a  balm on his burning skin.

“Yeah,” Fitz breathed out. “God, yes.”

“You feel alright after Manifesting like that?”

“Yeah, I’m good. I feel good.”

Hunter mouthed along Fitz’s jaw, humming and tingling his skin. Frustratingly, he was very obviously avoiding Fitz’s dick as he ran his hands along him, up and down from his thigh to his throat, over and over. Even when Fitz shifted underneath Hunter to get some kind of pressure, Hunter shifted himself and then tutted against Fitz’s mouth.

“We’ll get there, love.”

“Could we get there faster?”

Hunter pulled away and stroked his thumb over the curve of Fitz’s lower lip.

“I didn’t imagine you to be impatient in bed,” he admitted.

“Did you imagine what I’d be like in bed a lot?”

“Often, and vividly,” Hunter said, moving in to kiss him again. “I imagined you would be quite loud, and enthusiastic, which so far, I am right on both counts.”

He let his weight shift on Fitz again, his thigh pressing in between Fitz’s again, right against the firm line of his erection, begging to be touched. The pressure and friction of fabric startled him into a moan, head dropping back.

“You know I haven’t really done this with anyone, right?” Fitz asked a little breathless.

“Ever?” Hunter asked, pushing himself up off Fitz to catch his gaze.

“Once, but it was years ago, and it wasn’t great so it probably shouldn’t count at all.”

“Years ago? Really? You haven’t hooked up with anybody in  _ years _ ?”

Fitz shook his head.

“I haven’t really liked anyone that much. It can be too much with anyone else, and I get by fine on my own.”

Hunter grinned at that, and muttered, “I’d love to see that sometime.”

“We’ll get there,” Fitz teased in return. 

“Cheeky.”

“Hunter,” Fitz said seriously, pushing his hand up inside the back of his shirt, palm flat against warm skin. “You’re being a tease.”

Hunter laughed, warm and welcome, and kissed him, moving again to press the firm muscle of his thigh into Fitz’s cock. When Fitz’s hips jerked into him, Hunter didn’t scold him or tell him to settle. 

“God, you’re beautiful, you know that?” Hunter muttered instead, letting Fitz rut against him like some needy, horny teenager, praising him instead. “I could watch you all day, enjoying yourself.”

“Come down here and enjoy me yourself,” Fitz challenged, moving his hands to Hunter’s hips and tugging. Hunter let his weight fall onto Fitz, and let out the softest groan as Fitz’s own thigh met the hard line of his cock. 

“Fuck, love,” Hunter whined, burying his face into Fitz’s neck and breathing. “You’re incredible.”

Fitz guided his mouth back to his own, the pleasure rolling thick off of Hunter almost too much without his mouth saying things. This was why he didn’t randomly hook up with people even when he felt desperate for an orgasm, their emotional energies tended to be so cloying that he couldn’t enjoy himself, and if he was going to get naked and go through that effort for someone, he was at least going to enjoy himself. But, with all things, Hunter was different. Hunter mirrored his own pleasure and excitement instead of drowned it out. 

Hunter kept a good, even rhythm, moving against Fitz without stuttering or pausing, fluid and smooth. 

“You’re very good at this,” Fitz breathed, and Hunter laughed, kissing down his throat as he tipped his head back. “You’re much better than the first guy I did this with.”

“Good.”

“I am going to come in my pants if you don’t stop,” Fitz said, a particularly loud moan cutting him off with Hunter’s next roll of his hips, the drag of cloth just right against his desperate cock. 

“Go on, then, love,” Hunter said, voice low and almost guttural. 

“Hunter,” Fitz groaned, sliding his hands to hold Hunter’s biceps, anchoring them to each other. It was somehow Hunter’s quiet, little, bit-off moan in Fitz’s neck with the next roll of their bodies together, Fitz lifting his own hips to meet Hunter’s, and that quiet sound Hunter made, pure joy and pleasure, that set him off, hitting every point in his body with light, flooding out any shadows.

He tipped his head back and moaned Hunter’s name as he came, cock entirely untouched, the sound echoing into the empty space of the bunk, hips twitching to get closer to him. 

“That’s it,” Hunter muttered, speech slurring as he brought himself closer. “God, you’re beautiful, Fitz. So beautiful.”

Fitz kissed where he could reach, lazily, his energy completely spent. 

“What do you need to come? What can I do?” Fitz asked, whispering it so the world didn’t know what they were up to. Hunter shifted his weight, holding himself up with one hand while the other held Fitz’s jaw, their eyes met and held steady. Fitz couldn’t help himself from marveling at just how beautiful Hunter was, rutting against him desperately, small noises escaping him unconsciously. He could have stayed there forever, laying below Hunter as he took his pleasure, his own orgasm cooling in his veins, watching the way Hunter’s sunshine through whiskey eyes sparkled in the fluorescent lighting. Fitz idly wondered what it would be like to fuck Hunter in a patch of sunshine, the sun warming their skin as they panted against each other.

“Fitz,” Hunter finally whined as he came, hips jerking without abandon against Fitz's. He fell gracelessly on Fitz’s chest with a groan. “Holy shit, love.”

Fitz laughed, soft and happy. He stroked over Hunter’s back, breathing in the thick sweaty air between them.

“We should get out of these pants,” Fitz said.

“You just want to get me naked.”

“Well, yeah, obviously. But this is also very uncomfortable.”

“Don’t like dried cum in your pants, then?” Hunter teased. 

“Take off your pants, Hunter,” Fitz said, trying for firm and commanding. 

“Yes, sir,” he replied, moving off of him to strip off his shirt first, then without pausing, his pants and boxers went next. Fitz looked him over without moving, eyes roving over the length of his bare body, over muscles and scars he wanted to trace until he knew them by heart, to his spent cock and cum-soaked thatch of dark curls he wanted to bury his face in and breath in Hunter’s scent. “Are you going to take your clothes off, or do I have to peel them off you?”

Fitz couldn’t help the smirk that crept over his face.

“Oh, I see,” Hunter said, leaning over the bed to kiss Fitz. “That’s a challenge if I’ve ever seen one.”

Fitz tried to come up with something clever to say but Hunter kissed him quiet, his hands going to his fly and working at getting his pants undone.

“Sit up,” Hunter said, and Fitz did. Hunter rewarded him with another kiss. “I want to get you all the way naked.”

He carefully undid each button on his shirt, kissing Fitz with each finished.

“You should probably get some rest when I get these off,” he said, gentle as ever. “From what I remember from my Handler training, there’s usually a wave of exhaustion after the euphoria of Manifesting.”

“Oh, there is,” Fitz confirmed, feeling it hit like a wave overtaking him. Despite himself, he yawned. 

“Do you want to stay here or go back to your room?” Hunter asked.

“Here,” Fitz said.

“Good. Let me get this off then.”

Fitz let him push the shirt from his shoulders and then ease him onto his back to pull his jeans and boxers from his hips. He kissed Fitz's navel lovingly as he tossed away the clothes.

“I could look at you all day, Leo,” Hunter muttered, kissing up his chest and falling beside him.

“Later,” Fitz replied. “Snuggle me, please.”

“Yes, sir.”

Hunter shifted them  both so Fitz was on his side and Hunter was spooned behind him, their hands tangled at Fitz's chest.

“Good?” Hunter asked.

“Very good.”

Surrounded by the thick contentment radiating off them both, Fitz found himself drifting off peacefully, happy, satiated, and safe.

* * *

Hunter traced designs into Fitz’s skin, watching him doze gently. He thought of how Fitz came with his name on his lips, how he’d done that, how  _ he’d _ made Fitz feel that good without actually touching him, how Fitz trusted him enough to let him pleasure him like that. Fitz’s skin felt so good underneath his fingertips, and he couldn’t stop thinking about what it might be like to have Fitz’s legs wrapped around him, but given Fitz’s lack of experience, he didn’t want to start down that path without knowing Fitz would ever want that too. He could be patient. If this was all he had, that would be enough. 

Fitz would be enough for him. Forever. 

* * *

Fitz was contractually obligated to tell Coulson, and by extension, May about his new Manifestation. It had to be documented, and registered inside of the SHIELD database, and he had to be reconsidered if he was right for field work as a Manifested agent. He’d been through this process several times already, and it sucked every time.

He extracted himself from Hunter’s limbs the next morning, kissed him on the cheek, and left the safety and comfort of the bunk to find May. She was easiest to find in the mornings, as she had a very strict routine and she always had. He found her in the gym training, kicking the shit out of a heavy bag. It wasn’t always the heavy bag, Fitz knew, sometimes she did stretches and tai chi, sometimes climbing. 

“What is it, Fitz?” she asked without pause.

“I have to report something,” he said tiredly, leaning into the gym’s doorway. She stopped, and turned to him. “I Manifested again.”

“Okay,” May said and grabbed her towel. “Come on, then. There’s some paperwork.”

“Yeah,” Fitz said. “I know.”

He followed May out of the gym and up to the offices. It would be the same drill it was every time. She paged Coulson, and then Simmons to join them and sat him down at a round table while they waited.

“Are you alright?”

“Yeah, I am. It took me by surprise, of course, but it didn’t hurt. And I didn’t hurt anyone. Well, not seriously. I shoved Hunter on accident but he’s not – he’s fine.”

May nodded and typed out the response into the tablet. 

“And what were you doing when you Manifested?”

“ Ehh , well, I was with Hunter,” Fitz said carefully.

“Ahh,” May said with a chuckle, and tapped out her response. Fitz leaned forward to see what getting off with your boyfriend was translated to in Official SHIELD speak.

Apparently, it was  _ Personal relations _ .

“And you said you shoved him? Physically as a result of the Manifestation?”

“The Manifested power seems to be some kind of third telekinetic hand. I shoved him away with this magic hand.”

May nodded, and paused.

“He wasn’t doing anything that would warrant a shove correct?” 

“No, he was a perfect gentleman,” Fitz laughed. She nodded.

May had always secretly looked after Fitz and treated him as if he was her kid, at least he’d always thought so. It’d helped that he was still a kid, broken and terrified, when they’d met. They never talked about it, which he appreciated, and he imagined May did as well. 

“What’s going on?” Coulson asked, stepping into the office with Simmons on his heels. 

“Fitz Manifested last night,” May answered. “We’re submitting the registration paperwork now.”

“You did? Why didn’t you tell me?” Simmons asked.

“I was,  uhhh , busy,” Fitz said, “and then I was asleep. But I’m telling you now.”

“What were you busy with?”

“Hunter,” Fitz replied with a shrug as she sat down beside him. Instinctually, she reached out and pressed the inside of her wrist to his forehead and he leaned into it. Satisfied, she took her hand away. 

“Gross,” Simmons said.

“I’m not sure why you’re surprised.”

“I’m not, I just want it noted.”

“It’s officially noted,” Fitz said, gesturing to the tablet as Coulson sank into the seat beside May. 

“Time for a demonstration, Fitz,” Coulson said.

Fitz reached out, and just as it had before, he felt his reach extended, and he picked up the tablet pen May never used. He twirled it between these new fingers the way he’d always twirled pens when he was thinking, and marveled at how he could feel the plastic and metal as if the pen were moving between his actual fingers. 

“Interesting,” Coulson said. “Have you tested it any farther than that? How much you can move?”

“No, I fell asleep after Manifesting. But I managed to shove Hunter into a wall with it on accident, so it’s at least as strong as I am physically.”

“We’ll have to do some testing in the gym later,” Simmons said. “See what you can lift, and move.”

“Yeah,” Fitz said. “It’s weird, it’s different from the rest of my powers. Obviously. But this one feels easier. I’ve had control of it since it Manifested. I mean, I shoved Hunter on accident, but it hasn’t flared the way the rest of them did.”

Simmons nodded.

May pushed the tablet over to Fitz to agree and sign the forms. He trusted her to fill them out by now, and he signed blindly, pressing his thumb into the scanner at the bottom as a biometric agreement.

The tablet was then passed to Simmons to sign off on as his Handler, then to Coulson as his supervisory officer, and then finally,  May took the tablet back to sign and submit the forms as the actual filing officer.

“I really hope this doesn’t adjust my power level,” Fitz said tiredly. 

“I suspect it won’t, but we’ll have to wait for the official SHIELD directive on this. Not often someone Manifests this many abilities, you know,” Coulson said. “Unfortunately, that means we’re going to have to bench you until you’re cleared.”

“Ahh,” Fitz said softly. 

“Wait,” Simmons started to protest. “You can’t.”

“I wish we didn’t have to, but until Fitz is cleared by upper management, he stays grounded,” Coulson said. “You know the rules, Simmons. Fitz was kept from the lab after prior Manifestations for the same reason.”

“Fitz is also right here, and is fine with it,” Fitz added. “I’ll just finish the upgrades to the Bus that I’ve been wanting to get to.”

“Are you sure?” Simmons asked.

“Yeah, it’ll be fine. I’m not really good at the whole field work thing anyway.”

Simmons frowned, but nodded. He could taste the displeasure and irritation rolling off of her, bitter and dry.

“Does that bench Simmons as well?” Fitz asked.

“No, Simmons is still welcome on missions. She is not just a part of the team in the capacity of your handler, but as an independent agent free and separate from you.”

“I mean,  _ I  _ know that, but I just wanted to make sure you guys knew that,” Fitz said.

They looked between Fitz and Simmons, May with a seldom-seen quirked eyebrow.

“Simmons is her own person, and so far, she’s been treated like she’s my assistant. I know she’s not the one with the powers here, but that doesn’t make her any less valuable of an asset to the team. She’s the smartest person in this base, smarter than the rest of us combined, myself included, and I would appreciate it if the team, and no offense, the management as well, would recognize that.”

Simmons’s irritation subsided and was replaced with affection and warmth. 

There was a proud smile creeping into May’s expression, and when Fitz looked to Coulson, he was met with that same pride.

“Thank you, Fitz,” and Fitz was met with his genuine sincerity. “Simmons, we apologize for any miscommunication we might have had. You are absolutely your own agent, and act as an individual separate from Agent Fitz. We will be certain to keep that in mind for you, and the rest of the handlers in the future.”

“Thank you, sir,” Simmons said. “I’m happy to work with Fitz, obviously, we’re partners, but I do appreciate the leeway to be separate occasionally. Keeping me at Fitz’s side, and all handlers with Manifested, it seems like we’re just there to hold leashes. And I’m sure you understand would discredit both the handler and the Manifested. They’re not animals out of control, and we’re not zookeepers.”

Coulson nodded.

“We will make sure to avoid that in the future.”

“Okay, I got confirmation of the submission. You’re officially reported, Fitz, and you’re free to go,” May said.

Outside of the office, Simmons nudged him in the side with a sharp elbow.

“You and Hunter?” she asked.

“What do you mean, me and Hunter? You were there for my first date with him. You knew we were dating.”

“Did you have sex with Hunter?” 

“Oh, that. Yeah, I guess.”

“You guess?”

Fitz shrugged.

“There were orgasms, but it wasn’t, you know, it didn’t go that far.”

“Hmmm,” Simmons hummed. “Was it good?”

“It really was,” he replied. 

“That’s good!”

He nodded.

“So, wait, you Manifested in the middle of sex? Was it that good?”

“No, I Manifested before the sex.”

“Interesting,” she said, considering this. “It’s a very cool power.”

“Isn’t it?” he said, and she grinned at him. It was always Jemma who made that first step into accepting his powers, normalizing them, complimenting them. He never knew how he felt about them, especially when a new one came along so unexpectedly, but it was Jemma who put them in a new perspective. “All those times I complained about needing an extra hand and now I literally created one.”

“Plus, I imagine this hand is not restricted with normal size and volume matters, being a hand of force energy essentially, so we may be able to get into those small spaces for adjustments.”

Fitz smiled, and the nervous ringing he’d felt all morning since waking up beside Hunter faded away, the headache ebbing finally. 

* * *

“Hey, where have you been?” Hunter asked when they arrived in the lounge after a long walk around the complex. Fitz, split between training and Hunter and upgrading the Bus, hadn’t had enough time one-on-one with Simmons, so instead of heading to the gym for training, he’d asked her to hang out and ditch class for the day. She’d eagerly agreed, and they’d meandered, talking about everything, and anything, ranging from theories of what might make upgrades faster to wishes for what Fitz’s next Manifested power would be to what Fitz was starting to love about Hunter. “I was worried when you ditched out before I woke up.”

“Oh,” Fitz said, realizing for the first time that he hadn’t considered Hunter’s side of things. He was kind of an inconsiderate boyfriend. “Sorry. I had to report to Coulson and May my Manifest.”

Daisy looked up from where she was coloring at the dining table what looked like a mandala. It was a stress technique that had been recommended, but no one actually enjoyed. 

“You Manifested  _ again _ ?” Daisy asked. “What the fuck?”

“I didn’t ask for it to happen,” he reminded her, sinking into the seat on the couch next to Hunter. Hunter leaned in and Fitz immediately answered with a kiss. “I’ll make it up to you later.”

“I’m listening,” Hunter said quietly. 

“Not a conversation for public, darling,” Fitz replied. “I should probably be the one to tell you guys I’m benched for a while, though.”

The team stopped in the middle of whatever they were doing, Mack halfway through cutting a sandwich in half and Bobbi stretching to get a glass from the top shelf. 

“Wait, what?” Yo-Yo asked. 

“They can’t do that,” Daisy added.

Fitz shrugged.

“SHIELD protocol. Most people don’t Manifest any more than one ability, but the rare occasion when it happens, they are placed on essentially desk duty until they are cleared. Even when you’re not out in the field, they’ll place you on lockdown. Last couple of times, I wasn’t even allowed in the lab to work until they’d cleared me. Especially with flares.”

There was a stony silence before Jemma added, “it’s just temporary. It’s not that he’s in trouble. It’s just that new Manifestations can have serious flare ups, and SHIELD wants to avoid injury should a flare up happen.”

“They think that Fitz with thirteen powers now is going to be more dangerous after a Manifestation because some babies with new powers have a hard time controlling them?” Hunter asked.

“It’s just standard procedure,” Simmons said. “Fitz doesn’t mind, do you, Fitz?”

Fitz shrugged again. 

“Considering most other organizations would’ve thrown me in an isolation chamber and put me on inhibitors by now? Temporary lock down is fine by me.”

“Just because another place would treat you worse doesn’t mean what SHIELD is doing is right,” Daisy said. 

There was a general sound of agreement around them, and Fitz looked around at his team. There wasn’t an ounce of ill-will towards him, no jealousy, no anger, just concern and distress at his situation. Even Ward who hadn’t really warmed up to any of them seemed frustrated with the way SHIELD was handling this. He was glad to have them, glad to have joined the team despite his reservations about leaving the lab. This group of misfits, oddballs, and weirdos, all of them with different powers, different backgrounds, different traumas, different skills, they were becoming his family. 

* * *

At dinner that night, Coulson and May joined them for a group meal. About halfway through the meal, May’s eyes dropped to the tablet she kept on her, and she frowned.

“Fitz is benched indefinitely,” she said, looking up at Fitz, “per orders from the director himself.”

The table went silent.

“The director?” Coulson asked.

“What’d you do to the director?” Daisy asked Fitz.

“Nothing, as far as I’m aware. I’ve never even met Fury.”

“I doubt it’s personal,” Bobbi said, but she was frowning nonetheless. “But still, Fitz hasn’t shown any sign of being out of control since the team has formed, which is impressive given the  amount of abilities he has.”

“I suspect it’s the  amount of abilities that’s causing some worry in the upper management,” Ward mentioned. Fitz looked at him, and he shrugged. “There’s some myths that got passed around the Academy when I was there about Manifested with multiple gifts getting more and more unstable as they Manifested more abilities. It made some specialists I knew certainly a little wary.”

Daisy wrinkled her nose from where she was sitting beside Simmons.

“What bullshit.”

“I didn’t say I believed them,” Ward reminded her. “There are people with one power who turn explosive over anything, and there are people like Fitz who are perfectly capable of controlling their powers. It’s not about the abilities, but the person.”

“Awful progressive views for someone who spent so much time buddy-buddy with Hydra,” Bobbi commented innocently. Ward shot a look at her. “What? Forgive me if I’m still skeptical about your true allegiance, Ward.”

Hunter curled his hand around his fork a little tighter, and there was a kind of tension in the air that Fitz didn’t like. It hurt, actually, a stabbing pain of betrayal and confusion.

“Could we chill?” he asked, voice cracking in the middle. He massaged the back of his head where the ice pick of their emotions went in. If he got overwhelmed, he might actually have a flare and he didn’t want to prove upper management right. 

His phone chimed with an email, and he took the opportunity to distract himself.

“Holy shit,” he said, stalling as he looked at the notification. “Director Fury emailed me directly.”

“Is it an apology?” Daisy asked. 

“No,” Fitz said, opening the notification to read the email. The table was quiet as he read over the subject, and when he let out a quiet laugh, Hunter nudged him. “Director Fury is coming to the Lighthouse. He wants to have a personal conversation with me and assess me himself.”

He could feel the way everyone shifted at that, confusion and concern like an echo chamber around him.

“He said that he cannot settle the upper management and the council without a personal okay from the Director himself. He did actually apologize for the inconvenience, that he trusts May and Coulson’s judgement but cannot convince the council otherwise without his specific say so. He will be flying out tonight, and landing in the morning. He wanted to give us enough heads up, and I quote, to put the house back together for when Mom and Dad come home.”

There was a quiet at the table before everyone broke out in questions. He laughed; it was good to feel at home here.

* * *

Fitz followed Hunter into his room after dinner and dropped onto his bed without waiting. Hunter grinned at him and leaned over to kiss him, holding his face in his hands.

“How do you feel about all of this?” Hunter asked. 

“I’m fine with it. Everyone else had the problem,” Fitz replied. 

“Really? You’re completely okay with SHIELD arbitrarily benching you?”

“I am. Completely.”

“Really?”

“This is not my first time, Hunter. I had eight abilities when I joined SHIELD. I have thirteen now. I’ve been benched and reassessed every time. It’s fine.”

It didn’t sit right with Hunter personally, but Fitz smiled at him and curled his hands in Hunter’s shirt. 

“I appreciate you asking, though,” he said, tugging him closer. Hunter would’ve gone wherever Fitz wanted with the slightest nudge, extraordinarily eager to please, to touch and be touched. “I’ve been through a lot, you know, just like half the team, but it’s nice that someone cares about me.”

Fitz’s hands slid down to his hips and up under Hunter’s shirt.

“Of course, love,” Hunter said, voice going unexpectedly reedy with Fitz’s touch. “What are you doing?”

“Can’t I touch my boyfriend?” Fitz asked lightly.

“You’re in an awful good mood.”

“Yeah,” Fitz said. “I am. Might have something to do with the spectacular orgasm I had last night.”

“Oh, really?” Hunter asked, letting Fitz’s hands wander up his chest as he rucked up his shirt. “Should I be jealous?”

“Mmmhm, he was gorgeous, and sweet, and his kisses were magical.”

Hunter couldn’t help his laugh.

“Then what are you doing with me tonight?”

Fitz pulled his shirt up and over his head, dropping it onto the floor before exploring his chest. 

“Experimenting. It’s important that experiments be repeatable, or else the findings are flawed.”

“ Mmhm , sure, yeah, totally,” Hunter agreed. Fitz kissed his chest and stomach slowly. “I absolutely agree.”

“Good. Should we get started then, Agent Hunter?”

“God, yes, please.”

And joyfully and excitedly, he let Fitz lead.

* * *

Director Fury touched down just after dawn the next morning, and Fitz made sure that he was there on the flight deck when he arrived. 

“Director,” Coulson said, standing at Fitz’s side. May was on the other side of Coulson, and Simmons stood at Fitz’s other side, a united Manifested-Handler front. “It’s a pleasure to have you at the Lighthouse, sir.”

“I wish it were under better circumstances,” Fury said, and he turned his attention to Fitz. “Agent Fitz.”

“Director Fury.”

“I’m sure you want to get this over with as soon as possible. Why don’t we have a conversation on the way to the training room?”

“Yes, sir.”

Fitz walked side by side with Fury, Simmons a step behind them, which Coulson and May spoke with the pilot about where to find the guest quarters and the lunch room for some rest and recharging before they were off again. Fitz hoped they’d be off again soon, at least. It didn’t bother him that they’d benched him, or that they considered him a threat. He considered himself a threat most days, that’s what the team, and Hunter, didn’t understand. But the longer Fury was there, the most uneasy the team would become that Fitz was dangerous, or that SHIELD was treating Fitz right. He wanted to avoid that if he could. 

“I read the report,” Fury started. “You were with a teammate when you Manifested, correct?”

“Yes, sir. With Lance Hunter.”

“Were there any injuries?”

“No. Well, I shoved him into a wall with the Manifested power, but he wasn’t injured.”

“So, you have some sort of telekinesis,” Fury said.

“It’s a telekinetic hand of some kind. I can move objects with it, but also can feel through it, as if it were one of my own physical hands.”

“That is interesting. How do you feel?”

“Fine. It’s not extraordinarily powerful or unstable. It’s just like I grew another hand over night.”

“Wouldn’t that be something,” Fury commented with a chuckle. “I could get a lot more down with another hand.”

“That’s kind of what Simmons and I said.”

Fury looked at Simmons, and nodded at her.

“And how are you doing, Agent Simmons?”

“I’m good, Director. Fitz hasn’t flared with this power, so it’s been just another day for us, usually.”

“I assumed that any flare would have been reported,” Fury replied.

“Yes,” they replied in unison.

“How is working in the field?”

“Good,” Fitz replied. “It feels important, the work we’re doing, protecting kids in need. If there’d been a team like us when I was a kid, my life would’ve been vastly different.”

Fury nodded, looking Fitz over. 

“I’m sorry the world isn’t ready for you yet, Fitz.”

“Me too.”

Fitz turned into the training room where he’d first displayed his powers for the team on their first day together. 

“What exactly do you need me to display, sir? Just the power I last Manifested, or that I have control over the rest of them?”

“The Council would probably say the rest of them, but I trust Coulson, and May’s judgement, as well as Simmons’ bond with you. You haven’t exploded the compound or your lab in all of the years you’ve been with us. I’ve gone over your record as research, and you have exemplary control, more so than even our most seasoned agents with Manifested powers. The fact that you haven’t had a single injury during a flare is astounding, and the Council’s insistence that you somehow will destroy the world with one more power is exhausting.”

Fitz chuckled.

“I understand their hesitation,” Fitz said. “It’s not well-documented, what happens when someone has this many abilities, especially because there aren’t that many instances of it. Most have, what, one or two? At most, three. But people like me are  anomalous .”

“Anomaly or not, your record speaks for itself.”

“I appreciate that, Director.”

“Okay, show me your  _ magic hand _ , Agent Fitz.”

Fitz reached out with the extension and put his hand around one of the quarterstaffs they had on one wall for Bobbi and May to use. He brought it closer to himself and spun it around easily, mimicking the way he’d seen Bobbi twirl it around her. He was fascinated with Bobbi’s ability, the way movement came so easy to her, the way it seemed so fluid. He’d watched her in training, the way her power complimented her skills, or her skills complimented her power, he wasn’t sure about that. 

He tossed himself the quarterstaff and caught it with his physical hand, and then twirled it and tossed it back. The extension hand caught it just as easily. It wasn’t as fluid a movement as Bobbi could have done it, but that was Bobbi, of course. 

“Very good,” Fury said. “May I?”

He took a staff off the wall, and held it out like he was going to spar with Fitz’s extended hand.

“Sure,” Fitz said, adjusting the way his extension held the staff. They weren’t one-handed weapons, technically, but he would have to make do. Fury lunged at the staff, and Fitz held it up to block. They sparred for a minute, which was a unique experience that Fitz doubted would ever happen to him again. It did exhaust him a little physically, more so than any other power, his chest aching a little. 

“Good, good,” Fury said, holding his hand out towards the floating staff. Fitz set the staff in his open palm and let the power go, the extension folding up to rest inside of him. “That was very good, Fitz. You just Manifested that yesterday?”

“It’s one of the easiest powers I’ve ever had. It’s already part of me, and I don’t have to learn how it works. It’s just, it’s just another hand. I’ve had these my entire life,” he said, wiggling his physical hand at Fury a little. 

“And you feel confident that you have control over it?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You feel confident that your other powers are in control as well?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Agent Simmons,” Fury said, “do you feel confident that your Manifested partner is in control?”

‘Yes, sir, I do,” she replied.

He nodded.

“You are free to go. I will complete the paperwork today, and you will be reinstated tomorrow, Fitz. Thank you for your patience with this organization.”

“Can I ask a question, sir?”

“Of course.”

“If I Manifest any more powers, will this keep happening?”

“I will do my best to make sure it doesn’t. Unfortunately, I don’t control the Council, so I can’t guarantee anything, but you have done a lot for this organization, and your record is amazing, so hopefully with this meeting and that record, we can settle their bigotry enough to let you live your life.”

“I appreciate that, sir.”

“Go on,” Fury said, gesturing them out the door. 

On the way out, Simmons nudged him with a smile. He nudged her back, and felt that smile deep in his chest.

* * *

Everyone was too loud all of the time. Fitz had slept terribly the night before, for several nights leading up to that day, the night spent tossing and turning, unable to get his brain to shut down. Hunter was asleep peacefully beside him. All he needed was an orgasm and a kiss goodnight and he was out like a light, but Fitz couldn’t settle down. At half past three in the morning, he got out of bed, dressed, wrote Hunter a note explaining in case he woke up, and headed for a walk around the compound. He walked himself exhausted, but had to get to work by the time his brain was ready to sleep. But he worked, set up his station, got out his tools, and started working on the next upgrade.

The lab was quiet in the small hours of the morning, peaceful, but he felt Bobbi and Jemma coming before he heard them.

Bobbi, who could usually keep her emotions tethered and quieted, was bursting with fondness for Jemma, and Jemma was shouting how much she wanted to kiss Bobbi. Daisy swung by, and it was like an echo chamber of appreciation and low-level arousal. It would have been okay if he had had some sleep recently.

The worst part about his empathic abilities had always been that it wasn’t a radio he could turn on and tune into a specific frequency when he wanted. It was a solar panel collecting all of the sun’s rays. They had tried to train it so he could access it when he wanted, but it never truly went away. What they’d managed to do was find coping mechanisms for how loud and overwhelming groups of people could be. Fitz had trained his brain, for the most part, to take the input and put it to the background, white noise or a low-level hum. It was never gone, though. 

On bad days, it’s all he could hear and focus on.

“Hey,” Hunter said, swinging into the lab around lunch. “Are you okay? I haven’t seen you since we went to bed last night.”

When Fitz went to speak, though, it wasn’t with his own voice. It was his father’s voice channeled by his mimicry.

“I’m fine,” he replied, his father’s thicker, rougher Glasgow accent harsher than his own. He covered his mouth, and Hunter froze in place, eyes wide. He’d never flared with mimicry like that, and he’d never used his father’s voice before.

“What was that?” he asked. Fitz only shook his head, afraid to hear his father’s voice again. “Are you okay? What’s wrong?”

Jemma looked up from her notes across the lab, and her worry turned sharp in Fitz’s skull. He let out a tiny whimper, like a wounded animal, drawing away from them. 

“Fitz!” she hurried over to him. “Hey, hey, it’s okay. You’re okay. Just breathe.”

He wanted to scream, wanted to tear out his own hair, wanted to curl up and cry. He was too big for his skin, unable to breathe against the world pressing on him from all sides. 

“I can’t,” Fitz said, forcing the words out, even as they came out harsh and cold, his father’s voice that Fitz remembered so well, the way he would tell Fitz to stop crying, to man up, to shut up, to listen. 

“You can. You’re so good, and so brave, Fitz. You’re capable of reining this in.”

Fitz felt the burble in the back of his throat, begging to be let free. It was stronger than he’d felt in years, and he couldn’t control it this time.

“I can’t. I’ve got – I've got to go.”

“Fitz, wait,” she started to protest, but he reached out before she could continue, picked some place as far as he could go away from the Lighthouse, and let himself go. When he reappeared, letting out a breath, he was standing in the lake, ankle deep in the cold water. He dropped down to a crouch, and yelled, letting all of the power built up in his chest go. The darkness, hidden away inside of him, let free. His vision went dark, but he could feel the world around him, the water growing colder, the sun dimming, the hum of electricity from the nearby power lines waning. All of it drew into him, thrumming through him like excitement, and the world went quiet. 

He could breathe easier.

He could think.

“Fuck,” he said, and his voice was his own again.

His phone started ringing, Hunter’s contact on the screen when he pulled it out of his pocket.

“Hey,” Fitz answered, voice even without a single tremor.

“Hey?” Hunter asked. “You just had some melt down and then vanished, and all you say is  _ hey _ ? Are you alright? Where did you go?”

“The lake, apparently.”

“The lake? Why?”

“Chose a spot far enough way where I wouldn’t hurt anyone.”

“What happened?”

“I couldn’t sleep, and I haven’t been sleeping for the last few days. When I don’t sleep, my empathic senses get kicked into overdrive, and everyone’s emotions can overwhelm me. And I didn’t want to hurt anyone.”

“Are  _ you _ okay? Did you hurt yourself?”

“Yeah, I’m okay. I feel better.”

“Do you want me to come  get you?”

Fitz looked around, trying to locate the top of the Lighthouse. It was clear across the bay, practically miniscule.

“Yes, please. I went further than a mile this time, I guess.”

“What?” Simmons shouted from somewhere on the other of the phone.

“I’m on my way. Send me your location, and stay put.”

Fitz didn’t want to hang up the phone, though.

“Can you stay on the phone with me?”

“I can,” Hunter agreed.

“I’m sorry I didn’t say something sooner. There was so much going on, especially after Manifesting, and Fury visiting, and I just got overwhelmed. It hasn’t happened in a while and I forgot how terrifying it is.”

“I get it,” Hunter replied easily. “I’m going to get him. You can stay.”

It wasn’t an offer; it was an order. 

“Tell him he’s in trouble,” Simmons said.

“Yeah, I’m not doing that,” Hunter said to her. “Be back soon.”

“I’m apparently in trouble,” Fitz said lightly, moving to sit on the shore and lifted his feet out of the water, soaked and squishing. “I hope no one tells Fury. He cleared me himself.”

“No one will tell Fury. You’re okay.”

“Yeah.”

Fitz took off his shoes, and then his socks, wringing them out and then laying them out on the grass to dry.

“I landed in the lake itself, and now my feet and pants are so wet,” Fitz complained. “I hate wet socks.”

“The lake was an interesting choice,” Hunter said. “You don’t even like the lake.”

“I didn’t want to go near people. I wanted to be away from, well,  _ you _ so I couldn’t hurt you. There’s not anyone on the shore this time of day, although I was aiming for closer to the actual Lighthouse property.”

“I trust you, you know,” Hunter said. There was the sound of the elevator doors opening. “I trust you not to hurt me.”

“Hunter,” Fitz sighed.

“I do,” he continued, undeterred. “You’ve never shown me a reason not to.”

“Just because  _ I  _ wouldn’t hurt you, doesn’t mean I’m not capable of it.”

“So is everyone on base, love,” Hunter said. “Hold on. Someone’s getting on. Send me that location, please.”

Fitz sighed and took his phone away from his ear to go into his contacts and start sharing his location with Hunter permanently. It was easier that way, and it wasn’t like he had any secrets. He didn’t have a second life he didn’t want Hunter to know about. He didn’t go anywhere where Hunter couldn’t follow. 

He heard Mack’s voice, then Yo-Yo's when he put his phone back up to his ear. 

“Oh, nothing,” Hunter replied lightly. “Have to run an errand for Fitz, and I’ll be back. Won’t be gone long.”

Mack replied something that Fitz couldn’t make out.

“You’ve caught me. I’m sneaking away to fuck Fitz where Mum and Dad won’t find out.”

Fitz chuckled.

“This is our stop,” Yo-Yo said. “Have a good time with your boyfriend.”

“Thanks,” Hunter said. “See you guys later.”

There was the sound of the elevator doors closing and then Hunter sighed.

“Okay, now I’m on my way.”

“Is your errand going to be doing me in the car?”

“Do you want that?”

“I wouldn’t say no.”

Hunter laughed, and Fitz grinned to himself.

“I’ve got a better idea. Do you think Coulson will mind if I steal you for the day?”

“I think he can do without me for a day or so.”

* * *

Hunter found Fitz right where his location said he would, sitting up against the lake shore with his feet bare and his pants legs rolled up. He still looked amazing, and Hunter took a second to take in the midmorning sunlight on his features. He was looking out at the lake but turned as Hunter drew closer.

“If you wanted to go on a date, you could have just said so,” Hunter said lightly, crossing the grass to Fitz's place on the shore. 

“Thought this was more dramatic,” Fitz replied, and there was something of a laugh in his voice. Considering Fitz had flared this morning out of stress, it was nice to see him being himself, his voice his own. 

“ Certainly can’t argue with you there, love. Aren’t you a little cold?”

“It’s actually quite nice out. My toes are a little cold, but otherwise, it’s a gorgeous day outside.”

“And to think, we were going to waste it underground.”

“How silly of us.”

“Silly, indeed,” Hunter agreed. He helped Fitz up off the ground, pulling him into his space with a smile. “Come along. I have some plans for you.”

“How could you possibly have plans already? This just happened.”

“I have an on-going rolodex in my head of plans, in case something spontaneous happens. I hadn’t considered this being the cause, but I’m flexible.”

“Oh, are you,” Fitz teased. 

“I am, actually. Bobbi and I stretch every morning, and she makes me try things like yoga and Pilates.” Hunter delighted in the way Fitz’s eyebrow quirked up with interest. “We can talk about how flexible I am later, though. First, we have a date to go on, darling.”

“And what are we doing at said date, my dear?”

“I was thinking, there’s this old-fashioned arcade downtown and right next door is this old-fashioned soda shop.”

“Really?”

“You didn’t have the kind of childhood someone should have where you went downtown and played games with your mates, and just hang out, so I want to give you those experiences. Take you out like we’re a couple teenagers after school.”

Fitz tried to hide a pleased little smile, but Hunter was learning the way he hid. After so much bad, he was still skittish to show when he was happy, and that was okay. Hunter was willing to put in the time and the effort to show him that it was okay, that he was safe now. 

“Okay. Take me out, then, Hunter.”

* * *

The day had been fun. Fitz hadn’t laughed quite so hard in a long time. Hunter was exactly who Fitz needed him to be, and he had felt like a kid again – more specifically, he felt like he felt like a kid,  _ period _ . Fitz hadn’t had this kind of childhood, where he could skip out on responsibilities with his friends and have a day of play. He had been terrified and alone for so long, that he had stopped longing for it, but this was the collective dream of the institution. When they were left to their own devices, the kids he’d grown up beside would talk about what they missed, what they would do if they could break out. 

He was living a dream he’d long since abandoned, and it was all thanks for Hunter.

When they got back to the Lighthouse, it was quiet in the compound, and they snuck back into Hunter’s bunk and climbed into bed together. In the dark, laying on his side, facing Hunter, Fitz had never felt more comfortable with someone. Well, except Simmons.

“Were you scared the first time, when you Manifested?”

“Yeah,” Fitz said, “absolutely. I was ten years old, my dad was yelling at me for whatever, getting a B or something. I just remember getting so angry, he never appreciated anything I did, or congratulated me for anything, no matter what I did. All he ever did was yell at me and tell me how useless I was. I was so angry, and I got overheated, and I exploded in fire and light, and I was absolutely terrified of it. I’d heard my father condemn the Manifested all my life, and his face – I'll never forget how disgusted he looked.”

Fitz fell silent, unable to continue. When his dreams taunted him, his father’s sneering disgust as the institution door closed between them was always center stage. 

“Well, your dad was a fucking wanker, then,” Hunter replied. “I know how that is.”

“I’ve gotten used to how it feels to Manifest now, physically at least, but after, I always feel this shame that I know comes from him and how he raised me.”

“You have nothing to be ashamed of,” Hunter said, tracing fingertips up and down Fitz’s arm.

“I know. It’s taken years, and Simmons’ hard work, but I’m learning that.”

“What did your mum have to say? About your Manifest?”

“I don’t know. She was at work, Dad and I were at home, and then my dad took me away to the institution before she got home.”

“Holy shit,” Hunter replied. “Have you seen her since?”

“Yeah, after Coulson and May rescued me, and Simmons and I bonded, we went back to see her. She adores Simmons, and she’s been really accepting of everything I can do.”

“That’s good,” Hunter said. “Do you think she’d like me?”

“Of course.” Fitz traced the edge of Hunter’s jaw. “She’d absolutely love you. You make me happy, make me feel safe. That’s all she wants, for me to be happy.”

“Good, we have that in common at least. I would like to meet her someday.”

Fitz kissed him and said softly, “you will. I’ll take you the next time I go back to Scotland.”

“Really?”

“I’m not hiding this. I’m not ashamed of this, of you. My mum, she’s been nothing but supportive of my abilities. And when I came out to her as being queer, she was so good about that, too. She’d absolutely adore you, just like I do.”

Hunter kissed him next, soft and sweet.

“I adore you, too,” Hunter said.

“I know.” Fitz grinned.

“Thought you should hear it from me anyway.”

“I do like when you say things. You’ve got a good voice.”

“Thanks, love.”

Fitz kissed along Hunter’s jaw, taking in Hunter’s aura of soothing contentment.

“Can I tell you something?”

“You can tell me anything.”

“You know that I’m empathic, and new people are really overwhelming most of the time because I’m not used to how their emotions affect me.” Hunter nodded. “Well, when we joined the team, I was scared. Not only would I have to actively use my powers, I’d have to do it around a bunch of strangers. Even with Simmons around, I wasn’t sure how I’d react. But I walked into the conference room, and you were there –”

“Being devilishly handsome, yes.”

“—Being extremely bright and your presence just calmed me down. I couldn’t understand why. No one had ever done that before, and somehow, even when I was cranky and my head hurt and I wanted to hide, you made everything hurt less.”

“I’m glad I could help.”

“More than that, I was attracted to you in a way that I’d never felt with anyone else. Before we came to join the team, I hadn’t felt attraction to anyone, not in years. There were guys in the Academy that I felt a brief flirtation but nothing like that, nothing like with you. You were everything I ever wanted, still are.”

“Always will be, love.”

Fitz threaded his fingers through Hunter’s hair. 

“Baby, you’re making it hard to keep my hands to myself,” Hunter said, palms flat against Fitz’s chest.

“Maybe that’s what I want.”

“You said you wanted to talk.”

“I can talk and run my hands all over you. I’m good at multi-tasking.”

Hunter laughed.

“Can I tell  _ you _ something?” Hunter asked.

“You can tell me anything.”

“Bobbi and I used to be married.”

“No shit?” Fitz asked.

“No shit, just for a little bit, but still, legally she’s my ex-wife. I thought I should tell you. It was a dumb riding the high of bonding thing, where we thought we were in love, and I do love Bob. But not like that, you know. Not ‘til death do us part. Not, not like this.”

“Thank you for telling me.”

“I’m surprised she hasn’t told anyone. She likes to tease me about it.”

“What does she say?”

“That she was the best thing I’d ever have and I messed that up by thinking I was the best thing that ever happened to me.”

“Ouch,” Fitz said.

“She’s not entirely wrong. My ego has ruined a lot of my relationships.”

“I like your ego.”

“You say that now, but just wait. I’ll ruin this too. I ruin everything. I’m lucky Bob has stayed around as long as she has, even if we are bonded.”

“See, I won’t let you ruin it. I will forgive you, no matter what. There are pieces of me that I’ve never let see the light, Hunter, so as long as you promise to not let me ruin this, I won’t let you.”

Hunter kissed the very tip of Fitz’s nose.

“Will you show me one of those pieces?”

“I don’t know if that’s a good idea.”

“You don’t have to, but if you want, I’m here, and no matter what you do, no matter what you  _ can _ do, I am here. I’m not going anywhere, Fitz.”

Fitz stretched into Hunter and tucked his head underneath Hunter’s.

“I could hurt you.”

“You wouldn’t. I trust you.”

“Hunter,” Fitz mumbled.

Hunter’s hands came up Fitz’s back and gripped his shirt.

“Fitz, I trust you, love. I know you don’t trust yourself. I know that you’ve been taught for a lot of your life that you’re dangerous and wrong, but you are not. You are perfect, and beautiful, and kind. You won’t hurt me, no matter what you’ve been told.”

“I can’t control it.”

“I’m here, I’m trained to help you control it.”

“You’re not  _ my _ Handler, though.”

“I still have the training. I can handle it.”

Fitz let out a shaky sigh, and felt the begging at the back of his throat. His power wanted to reach out and touch Hunter so bad, feel his warmth underneath them.

“There’s a power that I never use, because it scares me. I’ve only intentionally used it a couple times and that was only for my evaluation. I used it today after I got to the lake, and it was a miracle I didn’t destroy something. I don’t have control over it. Simmons and I have tried, but I can’t reign it back in without her help.”

“Show me.”

Fitz shifted back until Hunter wasn’t touching him.

“It’s going to get a little cold, and dark in here. Pull me back if I don’t stop, okay?”

“Always, baby,” Hunter said. 

He let the begging go, feeling the darkness rise inside of him and reach out into the world. His eyes always went black, according to Simmons, and his face lost all color until he looked like a specter. The power reached out for Hunter first, his body heat the most enticing, siphoning it away and into Fitz, his own body taking it hungrily. Then, he reached out for the heat in the air and the energy from the electricity of the compound buzzing in the walls and in the lights. He couldn’t see the room, the power blinding him, but he sensed everything, the dimming lights, Hunter’s form shivering, the sap of warmth from the air until it was chilly. 

“Fuck, that’s, okay, not what I expected – shite, mate,” Hunter breathed out, and his teeth chattered. “Let go.”

Fitz fought against the power, pushing and pulling at it, pleading with it to let go.

“Fitz, please,” Hunter said. “Let go.”

_ I’m trying _ , Fitz tried to say, but the noise that came out of his mouth was more of a growl, inhuman and unnatural.

“Okay, okay, it’s okay. Just listen to my voice. Focus on that. Ignore anything else. Focus on me. I’m going to put my hands on you, let me know if you want me to stop.”

He felt Hunter’s hands against his chest, coming up to his neck.

“Come back to me. Let the power go. Find where it sits and if you have to, pry its hold on you off. I know you can do it.”

Fitz clawed at the power.

“Good. Keep going.”

He could hear the shake in Hunter’s voice.

“Just a little bit more, Fitz.”

His hands shook against Fitz’s chest but he stayed steady. Hunter’s strength and steadiness kept him level, kept him going. 

Then, Hunter’s face came back into view, the light returned to the room. 

And he felt his power let go. 

“There we go. Good job, love.”

Hunter moved into his space and kissed Fitz softly, slowly, sweetly.

“That was so good. I’m so proud of you.”

“I’m sorry,” Fitz said. “I didn’t want to hurt you.”

“You didn’t. I was just a little cold.”

“I’m sorry.”

“None of that. I’m fine. You didn’t hurt me. I’m fine. Look at me. Touch me, look me over. I’m just cold.”

Fitz reached out and touched Hunter’s chest, his shoulders, his arms, his wrists, his hands, each wonderful finger, back up his arms to his chest, over his stomach, to his hips. He pushed up under Hunter’s shirt, feeling his skin smooth underneath his palms.

“See? I’m okay.”

“You are cold,” Fitz said sadly.

“I’m warming up.”

“Not fast enough.”

“It’s okay. Come closer. You can warm me up.”

Fitz tucked himself back into the safety of Hunter’s arms, curling a little so he could tuck his head below Hunter’s chin again. 

“I see what you mean about not using that power, love,” Hunter said, “but I’m not afraid of you for it. You’re not dangerous. And I’m not leaving, okay. I’m not going to run from you because of this. I love you.”

It was the first time he’d said it, and Fitz smiled into his neck as he said, “I love you, too.”

Hunter pressed a kiss into Fitz’s forehead, and Fitz sighed contentedly. 

“Thank you.”

“You have nothing to thank me for, love.”

“I have so much to thank you for.”

“Well, in that case, luckily, we’ve got the rest of our lives, haven’t we?”

* * *

Hunter watched Bobbi interact with the team. They already knew Mack, and with Mack came Yo-Yo. She actively avoided Ward, having crossed paths with him during an undercover stint with Hydra Tech. But it was Daisy and Simmons who made Bobbi truly come alive. 

“So,” Hunter said, sitting next to Bobbi one morning.

“What?”

“What’s going on with you and them?” he asked, nodding towards Daisy and Simmons across the way, eating breakfast with Fitz.

“Nothing,” she said. 

“That was also extremely fast.”

“No,” Bobbi said. “Nothing’s going on. I just like being around them.”

“ Mmmhm , and I like being around Fitz.”

“Don’t be difficult.”

“Everyone knows you’ve got it bad for Simmons at the very least.”

“No, they don’t.”

“They do.”

“They can’t, but I don’t.”

He chuckled, and took a sip of his tea, staring at her. Then, as Simmons started to pass with her own breakfast, he reached out and flagged her down.

“No,” Bobbi said quickly.

“Hey guys,” Simmons said with a bright smile, stopping at their table.

“Hey, come sit here for a moment, will you? I need you to settle a debate here with me and Bobbi.”

“Okay.”

“Humor me as I take you on this hypothetical.”

“You don’t have to do this,” Bobbi interjected quickly.

“I said humor me,” he said pointedly at Bobbi, then turned his attention back to Simmons. “So, I know this girl, who is pretty even-headed. She doesn’t let anything affect her or flabbergast her in any way. She’s cool under pressure, and can think her way out of anything. And if she can’t think her way out of it, her reflexes are literally superhuman.”

“I like the sound of this girl,” Simmons said with a patient smile. Hunter saw the way Bobbi’s eyes darted from her plate up to Simmons’ face in surprise.

“She is awesome, right? Anyway, so she’s chill. There’s this other girl I know, who is a bit of a nerd. She’s hyper-intelligent. Very cute. She’s charming and sweet and a delight to be around. My friend insists that she’s not into her, except that every time they’re around each other, my friend drops things, and fumbles over her words, and spills stuff. Which is fine, except literally superhuman reflexes.”

“Hunter,” Bobbi hissed.

“I’m almost done,” he said. Simmons’ eyes kept moving to Bobbi’s face in return on the off-beat of Bobbi looking at her, and Hunter wanted to scream. “What should I tell this friend because I’m fairly certain that the other girl has feelings for her back?”

“Oh,” Simmons said. “I, uhhh, I don’t know. I’m sure if they truly liked each other, they’d say something. And I don’t think it would be your place to intervene on that, personally.”

She was blushing deep crimson as she stood up and hurried away, leaving her plate behind. Bobbi reached over the table and smacked him hard in the arm.

“ You asshole!” she said. 

“If you’re going to pine, either do it quietly or do something about it, Bob.”

“We’re not all Lance Hunter, you know, confident and charming.”

“You’re plenty confident and extraordinarily charming yourself. If you want her, just go for it.”

“Just butt out, okay?”

“Okay.”

* * *

“Are you sure you don’t want to take the afternoon off?” Fitz asked, hands slipping and nearly tearing a wire from the circuit as Simmons’ wave of bitter unhappiness hit him again. She hadn’t been happy with him about his little power melt down a few days before, of course, but not to the point where she would radiate such distaste. 

“Why?” she snapped at him. Not to the point where she was snapping at him like this.

“I don’t know. You just seem a little stressed today, that’s all.”

He tried to say it delicately, but Simmons frowned at him like he was intentionally trying to upset her more. Unfortunately, he could taste her feelings in the back of his throat, trying not to let it into him this time the way her emotions sometimes changed his own.

“I don’t care what I  _ seem _ like, you don’t know what I’m feeling.”

“It’s not my fault you’re basically shouting your displeasure at me, Simmons,” Fitz snipped, head aching with the waves of everyone’s presence still. He’d burned off most of the ache with his power explosion at the lake, and with feeding off Hunter in bed that night, but as always, his powers had consequences. “If you don’t want me to know, maybe you should learn to keep it to yourself.”

Simmons turned on her heel without another word, and left, leaving them behind, her wave of anger following her thankfully.

“Wait, what was that about?” Daisy asked, looking at him from where she was typing on her laptop, working on coding for him to go along with the upgrade he was finishing up. “Can you read our minds? ‘Cause that would have been nice to know before  _ now _ .”

“No, I can’t read your mind. One of my abilities is empathic senses. I know what everyone is feeling all of the time, unless you’re  _ capable _ of whispering it. It’s how I know Hunter has been staring at my ass for the last ten minutes while I’m trying to finish this circuit, and being  _ extremely _ loud about it.”

“Stop having a great ass, love,” Hunter said lightly from the edge of the lab, flipping through a magazine idly. He was a calming presence for Fitz, and he was grateful for Hunter just hanging around even though he should have been working with Bobbi upstairs. He needed it after the week that he’d had. Even if he wasn’t walking on eggshells around his own stability, he’d want Hunter here.

“How does it even work?” Daisy asked. “You weren’t looking at Hunter, but you knew what he was doing by his emotions?”

“It’s hard to explain, but everyone has this aura of emotion that they just naturally emit because they feel things, which I can block out most of the time. It’s like a low-level hum that you get used to if you’ve heard it long enough. Except some people project their emotions, especially when they’re upset, like Simmons when she’s angry. Hunter, however, is doing it purposefully, because he knows that I can feel it, and there’s just a very specific emotion he gives off when he’s staring at me that I can’t really vocalize. It’s attraction, but also feels a little like smugness.”

“It’s horniness,” Hunter commented, flipping another page. 

“I know,” Fitz said, looking over his shoulder at his boyfriend. “I know that, love, but horny is only part of it.”

“Gross,” Daisy said.

“You asked,” Fitz replied, shrugging while he continued to work. “And I’d like to apologize just in general for knowing all of your secrets because of how you react to things.”

“What do you know?” she asked, stepping up into his space.

“That you’re attracted to Jemma, and aren’t sure how to approach her about it. That you’re still scared of getting to know your parents because you’re afraid that you’ll get attached and they’ll disappear again. And that you really, really like burritos, a little too much sometimes,” Fitz said. He knew more. He knew a lot of things about the team he wished he didn’t, and he’d tried to train that power to be something he reached for instead of a constant alert sweep, but it hadn’t ever worked that way. He was a satellite dish always turned on, waiting to receive data from everyone, and everyone was so loud about it. “Sorry.”

“What do you know about Hunter?” Daisy asked, pulling herself up onto the lab table. 

“I mean, we’re dating, so a lot.”

“Based on his emotions, then.”

“I mean, the reason we’re together is because I could feel that he genuinely liked me so I wasn’t afraid to get close to him, but beyond that, I know that he’s avoiding Bobbi right now and feels guilty about it, but he’s also having a good time staring at my ass and that’s making him feel less guilty.”

“I never regret getting to see you work,” Hunter commented. “Plus, if Bobbi were here, you’d also know that she doesn’t want me with her right now.”

Fitz turned, and looked at his boyfriend.

“What did you do?”

“I didn’t – okay, look, sometimes I’m not at fault, you know.”

“Not so far, you’re not,” Fitz said. “In my experience. And also, there’s a really bitter aura of actual guilt around you. It’s a little distracting.”

“It’s the reason Simmons is angry,” Hunter said softly. “I said something about her and Bobbi, and how she should just go for it – sorry Daisy – but I said this in front of Bobbi, and now they’re both cross with me.”

“Simmons does not like to be match-made,” Fitz offered. “But you are right. They really should just go for it, and I can say from experience that, Daisy, you could probably also go for it with both of them. I’m sick of getting waves of fucking pining everywhere I go.”

“You think that they’d want to have a threesome with me?” Daisy asked, unfazed by this conversation the way Simmons would be if she were here.

“Yes,” Hunter answered.

“Yes. Well, sort of. I think they’d want you to be in a threesome with them forever,” Fitz elaborated.

Daisy paused, and hopped down from the lab table.

“Excuse me, I have some girls to proposition.”

Then, she was gone.

“Come here,” Hunter said, putting his magazine down and gestured him over. Fitz stayed still by the lab table for a moment. “Come here, love.”

When Fitz stayed still, Hunter stood and crossed the lab to him.

“Let me cleanse that emotional palate, babe.”

Fitz rolled his eyes but didn’t argue as Hunter took the belt loops of his slacks in his fingers and tugged him close. 

“What do you feel from me now?” Hunter asked, dragging his lips, open-mouthed over Fitz’ jaw and down his neck. 

“Arousal,” Fitz whimpered out, gripping the front of Hunter’s t-shirt. “Contentment. Smugness.”

“Does that taste better?” Hunter asked. 

“Much.”

“Good,” he said, and he stepped away. “You should get back to work.”

And with that, he was gone, Fitz left alone in the lab. He turned back to his work, shaking his head at his boyfriend, the ever-infuriating tease. That was okay, Fitz thought, he’d get him back later after their date. 

“I know it’s not your fault,” Simmons grumbled later on when she’d slunk back into the lab with a softer aura of shame, “but I wish you’d just let me feel what I’m feeling without commenting on it. Or trying to fix it.”

“Noted,” Fitz said, turning back to the circuitry in front of him. 

“Fitz,” she said softly, resting her cheek against his shoulder blade. “I’m sorry. You were just trying to help.”

“It’s also not my fault what Hunter said, you know. I don’t control his mouth, even if he’s right.”

She sighed, but it didn’t have the same low anger to it. In fact, she was glowing with a kind of pleasure that Fitz couldn’t ignore, loud and bright in the back of his head.

“Well, I can’t be angry at him, or you for that. He was right. I could, and I did, and it was great.”

“I can sense that.”

“Right. I forget about that.”

“I don’t,” Fitz said, but he wasn’t bitter about it this time. He was glad she was happy. “I just want to take care of you, you know. You’ve been taking care of me for over a decade, and it’s the least I could do to remind you to take care of yourself.”

“Thank you,” she said. There was a moment of silence between them, and then she said, “Tell me what you managed to do while I was gone.”


	3. Chapter 3

They were out looking for a girl named Samantha who had escaped an abusive foster home and Manifested in the middle of Times Square in a well-documented explosion of light and actual fireworks. There were so many videos from tourists in the area that Fitz could have run a 3D simulation on the event that they could walk around in. In one video they’d watched, she’d been hurried away by men in NYPD uniforms, but something about it didn’t sit right with anyone on the team. They packed their gear, and flew to New York City. 

“What do you mean that she’s not here?” Daisy asked at the front desk.

“We shipped her back to her family in Philadelphia.”

“Her foster family who beats and abuses her, you mean.”

“We don’t have any evidence of that.”

“She’s covered in bruises.”

“Well, she just violently Manifested. She could have gotten those bruises then.”

“You don’t,” Daisy paused and took a deep breath. “Okay, can I have her address? We’re just checking to make sure that she gets the help she needs to control her powers.”

Address in hand, they made their way to Philadelphia.

“I’m worried,” Daisy said softly to Fitz. “I don’t like this.”

“Me neither.”

“They could be doing terrible things to her, or they could try and she might lose control, and then she’ll get hauled away by the Administration.”

“I know. We’ll find her, and get her some place safe.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. We’re good at this.”

“We are. We’re good at this,” he agreed.

Samantha’s foster home was dark when they got there, but something didn’t sit right in Fitz’s stomach. He felt nauseated, and sat rigid in his seat as Hunter climbed out on one side of him, and Bobbi on the other. 

“Coming, love?”

“I don’t like this,” Fitz breathed, looking at the house. There was something like terror radiating off the building, and he didn’t know how to tune it out. 

“Can you feel her inside?” Hunter asked.

“Someone is, and they’re fucking terrified.”

“Sounds like that might be our girl,” Bobbi said. 

“Might be,” he replied. 

“Let’s go get her,” she said. Fitz nodded and climbed out of the car after Hunter. Ward and Daisy knocked on the door of the house, while Bobbi and Hunter circled one side, Fitz and Simmons going the other direction. There was no response at the door, but Fitz swore someone was home. They had to be. He could feel them, the knotted pressure of their fear pressing in on his brain. He almost couldn’t breathe around it, couldn’t think. He took a few steadying breaths, and tried to narrow down the feeling, locate exactly where it was as he had before. 

“Whatever this feeling is, it’s coming from the basement,” he said.

“Are you sure?” Simmons asked.

“Yeah. It’s definitely down, so unless she’s in the earth,” he said, and then was struck with the horrific idea that she had been buried alive. It was not a useful feeling, but – it felt real, this terror that she was alive, but her breath was shallow, and it was getting harder and harder to breathe. “She’s afraid she’s not going to get out of the dark.”

“What was that?” Simmons asked.

“I don’t – I haven’t been able to, to feel it this succinctly before. She’s in the basement, in the dark where she belongs, in order, in order to be punished. Jemma, we have to get her out of there.”

“What are you talking about? How do you know that?”

“It’s, I think my, my – Jemma, please.”

“Okay. Let’s find a way in.”

“We don’t need to.”

He grabbed onto Simmons and focused on that fear in the basement, and let himself go there. There was always a whoosh, a moment of confusion, and then, they settled on the basement floor. Fitz headed straight for the girl’s aura of terror, to a closet underneath the staircase. 

“Fitz, wait,” Simmons said, but he couldn’t, pulled forward. He tapped on the door cautiously.

“Samantha? Are you in there?”

“Who is that?” a small, trembling voice from inside asked.

“My name is Fitz, Leo Fitz, I’m an agent with SHIELD.”

“You are? Why are you here?”

“We help people like you, kids with powers who need a little guidance on how to use their powers.”

“What do you know about that?”

“I was a kid with powers who needed a little guidance, and SHIELD saved me. If you let us, we can get you out of here and protect you.”

“I can’t come out,” she said meekly. “I can’t open the door.”

“Oh. Is the lock on the outside?”

“Yeah.”

He ran his hands over the door, and found the hook and eye latch at the top, and then the lock on the knob itself. He unlatched both and opened the door slowly, peeking in.

“Hi,” he said softly. “Can I open this farther? Would you mind?”

“I thought they were going to leave me in forever,” she said. “I hate it in here. I don’t want to be punished.”

He had to swallow against that, unable to ignore the jump his own heart rate. There had been a time when he was exactly in Samantha’s place, bruised and abandoned and unloved, stuck away where no one would see him, left to rot and wither. 

“I understand,” he said. “Will you come out?”

He held out his hand, and Samantha reached out, put her hand in his carefully. 

“ FitzSimmons , where are you?” Bobbi asked into the  comms .

“ Uhh , inside,” Jemma replied. “Fitz had a feeling.”

“Fitz and his damn feelings,” Ward grumbled.

“ _ Fitz and his damn feelings _ can hear you and are a little busy,” Fitz replied, helping Samantha out of the closet. She was hideously bruised, far more than in the video, and Fitz smiled at her, a small gesture of hope.

“How’d you get inside?” Ward continued.

“Teleport,” Simmons said. 

“Who’s she talking to?” Samantha asked.

“Our team. We’ve got little communication devices in our ear. See?” 

He took the  comm out and showed her in the palm of his hand. 

“Huh,” she said, poking it gently. “Cool.”

“Yeah, keeps us in contact when we’re apart.”

He put his  comm back in and heard Hunter first.

“- ovement out back. Simmons, get Fitz and the kid out of there.”

“What’s going on?” Fitz asked.

“Out,” Ward and Hunter said at the same time. 

“Do you need anything from the house?” Fitz asked, and Samantha shook her head. “Do you mind if I take us somewhere very quickly?”

“Sure.”

“Jemma,” he said, taking Samantha’s hand and holding his other out to Simmons who took it, and he remembered the car they’d come in at the side of the road, the sidewalk beside it, and let go. 

But something went wrong.

He landed at the sidewalk with Samantha and Simmons, and then, he was being yanked backwards, back into the basement where he collided with the wall, the air knocked out of him. The thick smell of earth and mildew nearly overwhelmed him, and he could hear a commotion through  comms , Jemma shouting, the sound of a fight out back. His head was ringing, full and heavy.

“Fitz,” a voice he didn’t recognize said, but it wasn’t coming from the  comms . It was in his own head. “Leopold Fitz.”

“Who is it?” he asked out loud.

“You’re very clever, you know, very clever. Exceedingly, and irritatingly so.”

“Thank you?”

“So, I wonder if you’ll figure it out,” they said. “I’m sure you will with the right clues.”

“What?”

“Hurry, hurry, Leopold. The time is ticking down. A little lost, a little dark, a little less was found. But now, we must lie, and play, and try, try again some other day.”

The ringing stopped, and Fitz fell to his knees, retching in the corner of the basement. 

“Fitz,” Hunter said into the  comms . “Fitz, please come in.”

“I’m here,” Fitz said, wiping his mouth. “In the basement still.”

“I’m coming down to get you.”

* * *

When Hunter got to Fitz, he was still in the basement, on his knees, no cuts or bruises on him, but he looked dazed.

“Are you okay?”

“I’ve never bounced back like that,” Fitz said. “And I heard a voice.”

“A voice?”

“Like, like the void person we met imitating Abigail. And then again with Rhea. But I didn’t see anyone.”

“Might have been the movement we saw,” Hunter said, ducking down and helping Fitz to his feet. “I wonder if the void impersonated Samantha and drew her foster parents away, and then circled back when Samantha was safe.”

“Why would they do that?”

“No idea. Whatever the void is, I’m not sure I like it.”

Fitz leaned into him, and Hunter could feel how shaky he was, the exertion of power taking its inevitable toll on him. 

“We’ll map it all out when we get back to the Lighthouse. Let’s get you safe first.”

Fitz curled his hand into Hunter’s jacket, and sighed.

“Hey, thanks, Hunter.”

“Don’t need to thank me. I’m  your team, remember?”

“Yeah, but I’m not sure Ward would do the same.”

“He won’t have to. I’m here.”

“ Yeah. Good.” Hunter couldn’t help himself from leaning in and kissing  Fitz's temple. “Very good.”

“I’ve got Fitz. Everyone okay?” Hunter asked. 

“All clear,” Daisy answered. “Let’s get out of here .”

“Won’t argue with that.”

* * *

They handed Samantha over to the agents in charge of training and Manifested care before heading for the Lighthouse. Fitz stood in the  lab, weary and quiet, with the whiteboard in front of him, twirling a marker.

“What’s this?” Daisy asked stopping in the lab. “Writing poetry now?”

“I think that I’m supposed to know Void.”

“Are you?”

He tapped the whiteboard with his marker where he’d written out what he knew about the thing they’d been calling  “the void”, including what they’d said to him that day.

“ They called me Leopold.”

“That’s your name, though.”

“No, I know, but how often has anyone called me  Leopold? Especially in the field. The last time I was known actively as Leopold was the institution.”

“You think they’re a Manifested you knew?”

“The institution is backed financially by Hydra Technologies, right? The work they were doing there was for Hydra itself. Hydra is more than interested in controlling Manifested powers and by getting ahold of newly Manifested, they’re able to study the Manifest itself more closely and therefore tamper with it. Plus, they can incorporate the Manifested into their ranks.”

“Okay.”

“I didn’t know anyone at the institution with this power, but that doesn’t mean they couldn’t have gained new powers since.”

Daisy nodded. Hunter and Bobbi crossed into the lab with  Jemma and Mack following. 

“What’s this?” Hunter asked.

“ Trying to work something out. Piece together some clues.”

“So Void is telepathic,”  Jemma said, taking her place at her work station. “And you were obviously kids together.”

“That was my assumption.  We must lie, and play,” he repeated. 

“A little lost, a little dark, a little less was found?” Bobbi read. “What does that mean?”

“Might be a reference to  isolation,” Fitz said. “If we misbehaved, we’d be thrown in the hole  for solitary confinement, and that changes you. You lose a little bit of yourself.”

Bobbi nodded.

“ What about  Aubrey?”  Hunter asked. Fitz raised an eyebrow at him. “I do listen when you talk, you know. You said that she needed help controlling her powers, and you said that you’d help her, but you got thrown in solitary and when you came out, she was gone.”

Fitz turned to the  whiteboard and wrote Aubrey’s name to one side.

“She was telekinetic,” Fitz said, “but that doesn’t rule out her Manifesting telepathy after she disappeared.”

“ You going into solitary instead of helping her at a young age like that could be viewed as a lie ,” Jemma said. “That could feel like a betrayal, something you’d want revenge for, especially if she  considers you responsible. Hydra could use that to their advantage to try and cross off our team and the work we’re doing.”

“It seems weird, though,” Fitz said. “Void hasn’t actively tried to take any of the kids. They’re just  _ there _ when we get there.”

“Trying to get us to take them with us, though,” Mack added. “With Abigail, they were posing as her where we could see her. Same thing with  Rhea.”

“ Maybe  instead, they’re trying to get to  _ you _ ,” Daisy said, leaning into the work station closest to Fitz. “ I wonder what Hydra, or Void themselves, wants with you.”

“I’d certainly prefer if I wasn’t the target.”

“Unfortunately, pretty boy, that’s not how it works ,” Daisy said. “ Don’t worry,  Fitzy .  So far yo u’re good at detecting them, at least, and we can protect you. Hunter by himself could protect you.”

Fitz looked over at Hunter who winked playfully at him.

“ You know it,” Hunter said, and Fitz could feel the intentional  aura of fondness around him. He rolled his eyes and turned back to the whiteboard.

“ We’ll figure it out,” Jemma said. “We always do.” 

* * *

It stayed in the back of  Fitz's mind, though, Hunter could tell. His eyes would go distant, his  lips turned down. 

“Hunter, stop staring,” Fitz said at dinner one night.

“Can’t,” he replied. “You’re adorable.”

“And I’ll be adorable if you blink.”

“Can’t. What if I miss you do something even cuter?” Fitz wrinkled his nose at Hunter to which he said, “s ee? Right there, that was super cute.”

“Are you trying to distract me?” Fitz asked. “I don’t need to be distracted. I’m fine.”

“I don’t know  what’s going on in your head up there, but you know you’re safe, right? You’re okay here, and  the team is here to take  care  of you.  We’re strong, and work good together, and that void person, whoever they turn out to be, won’t stand a chance against us.”

“I know. I trust you.”

Hunter took Fitz's hand and stroked his thumb  across the back slowly, looking at where  they touched instead of continuing immediately. He wanted to keep Fitz safe as much as possible,  even outside of his own capabilities.

“Are you okay?” Hunter finally forced himself to ask.  Bobbi had complained he didn’t  ask enough questions, didn’t talk about her enough, wasn’t curious enough about her life. She’d  said it was something that she believed ruined their marriage, because she felt like he  didn’t care about her day to day. 

He’d promised to be better for Fitz.

“I’m okay,” Fitz said. “I don’t want to believe that it’s Aubrey. She was a kid, you know, but she wasn’t, she wasn’t this.”

“People change, though, especially as they grow up. She could be a completely different person than the girl you knew.”

“It ’ s hard to believe  that she’d grow up to hate me like this, though.”

Hunter brought Fitz's hand up to his lips and kissed his knuckles, and Fitz smiled this shy,  beautiful smile that Hunter hadn’t seen him give anyone else. He didn’t have Fitz's gifts, and he especially wasn’t empathetic, but he knew  how Fitz felt about him. He’d known before they’d said it. Fitz had the most expressive eyes, and Hunter could see the world in them.

If Hunter were a fortune teller, he could  weave tales of the future from those eyes, the way they shone, the way they sparkled in even the dimmest lighting.

He had to do something for Fitz to get his mind off this. They needed a break, a holiday where it could be them, just them, and no  one around to barge in or interrupt so he could really show Fitz how he felt. Maybe Fitz knew, the same way Hunter knew , but it wouldn’t be adequate to just say it. He wanted to prove it.

* * *

“Hey Fitz, can I see you outside for a moment?” Hunter asked, ducking into the lab door. “Just for a quickie. I mean. Quick moment.”

Fitz chuckled and set down his tool, heading towards the door, giving a shrug to Simmons. 

Outside of the lab, Hunter had a bag packed.

“Are you running away or something?”

“Oh.  Ehm , no. It’s a surprise getaway. I cleared it with Coulson. We have forty-eight undisturbed hours to go anywhere we want, and I booked up a couple nights at the Plaza hotel in New York.”

Fitz gawked at Hunter for a minute.

“Please say something.”

“Yes,” Fitz said. “Absolutely yes. Let me just put my stuff away in the lab.”

He leaned in and kissed Hunter quick before ducking back into the lab to clean up his station.

“Where are you going?”

“On a weekend getaway with my boyfriend, apparently,” Fitz said. “Hunter is taking us to New York.”

“That’s incredibly sweet,” Simmons said. “Please be safe, and come home alive.”

“What do you think is going to happen, exactly?”

“I don’t know, but we haven’t really been apart since we met, and I know this will be good for us, but I’m going to miss you.”

“It’s two days, Jem.”

“I know.”

“We can do two days.”

“Yeah.”

“Have Daisy and Bobbi distract you. I know they’re good at that.”

There was a happy glaze that passed over Simmons as he finished taking down his station and putting all of his toys away. He tucked his half-finished design into the correct storage unit that he’d labelled that morning, and turned to see Hunter leaned against the doorframe, scrolling idly through a feed on his phone. 

Fitz stopped to press a quick goodbye kiss to Simmons’ cheek and then met Hunter at the door.

“Did you pack a bag for me, too?” 

Hunter reached over and wheeled a second bag out from behind his.

“Of course, baby. I’ve got you taken care of. Don’t you worry about a thing.”

“I love this level of pampering happening.”

“There’s so much more, just prepare yourself.”

The entire plane ride from base to New York City, admittedly a short ride, Fitz kept his eyes on Hunter.

“It’s not my birthday,” Fitz said once.

“No.”

“It’s not our anniversary.”

“Certainly not.”

“Did you break something and you’re trying to make up for it?”

Hunter laughed, and replied, “not that either.”

“Is it  _ your _ birthday?”

“You know when my birthday is,” Hunter said. “Is it my birthday?”

“No. It’s not.”

“Why are you so concerned about the occasion?”

“I don’t want to have forgotten something important.”

Hunter said softly so only Fitz could hear him over the hum of the plane’s engine, “this is just because I’ve never fucked you above ground, love, and you deserve a nice weekend after everything we’ve been through recently . Mostly the fucking though.”

Fitz felt his flush spread quickly over his face and down his neck. He still wasn’t used to Hunter’s blatant affections and lack of shame. 

“You mentioned once, actually, wanting to have sex in the sun, so I specifically requested a room that got the most amount of light,” Hunter continued. 

“That’s actually really sweet,” Fitz said. 

“And entirely selfish.”

“Well, I’m not complaining.”

Hunter kissed his shoulder and went back to the Sudoku he was halfway through. Fitz couldn’t take his eyes off Hunter the rest of the ride, even when Hunter caught him staring. 

“I’ll be back to pick you up at noon on Monday,” May said. “Behave. Don’t burn down New York.”

“Thanks, Mum,” Hunter said jokingly, leading the way off the jet and onto the tarmac where an airport employee escorted them into the airport. They caught a cab to the hotel and checked in, Hunter holding Fitz's hand the entire way.

“Okay, Mr. Hunter, I’ve got you in room 1201, as requested. How many keys would you like?”

“Just one will be fine,” Hunter answered. Fitz looked up and around at the hotel lobby. He felt underdressed just standing in the lobby. 

“If you need anything, don’t hesitate to call down for any of your needs, and I hope you enjoy your stay here at the Plaza.”

“Thank you so much, Elia,” he said, and turned to Fitz. “Come on, love.”

Hunter took his hand up again and led him across the lobby to the elevators. 

“Are you sure about this? I mean, this is a really expensive hotel,” Fitz said.

“Don’t worry about the price, Fitz. I’ve got this. You enjoy yourself.”

“Are you  _ sure _ ?”

Hunter put his hand on the small of Fitz’s back and guided him into the elevator. After the doors closed, Hunter pressed the twelfth-floor button, and turned to Fitz. 

“You deserve a nice weekend, like I said before, and also, I booked a king-sized bed with a lot of light so I can fuck you senseless. This is a very, extraordinarily selfish plan on my part.”

“Yeah, but this is a super expensive hotel considering I’d let you fuck me in a dirt patch outside.”

“Would you really?” Hunter asked, clearly amused and intrigued in equal measure.

“Yes, well, I’d certainly prefer in a bed, but, you know, if it came down to it, I wouldn’t mind.”

Hunter kissed him soft and sweet as they came to their floor. 

“If you’d prefer a bed, then you’re going to adore this one, love. Come along.”

The room was extravagant. The bell hop had already brought up their bags while they waited, and had been left with care in their room. But the room itself was beautiful, trimmed in gold with a balcony overlooking a courtyard, and in the middle of the room, there was a king-sized bed. Hunter stepped up behind Fitz and pressed his body into Fitz's back, hooking his chin over his shoulder.

“What do you think?”

“It’s beautiful, Hunter, but it’s so lavish.”

“Stop worrying about the price. I have been getting a healthy paycheck from SHIELD that doesn’t need to go to food, a car, or housing. My bank account is absolutely flush, so if we wanted to live in the Plaza, we could. I don’t want you to worry about anything. Let me take care of you.”

“Should we start by testing the bed?”

Fitz turned to face Hunter and took his hands, walking them backwards into the room to the plush, expansive bed. They could do  so much on that amount of mattress, and Fitz delighted to  picture it. They fell into the mattress side by side and sighed out together, the mattress just the right kind of plush and firm. 

“Holy shit,” Fitz breathed out. He was used to the bed in the base which was useful and did the job, but it wasn’t anything like  _ this _ . “I might take you up on that offer to live in the Plaza.”

Hunter laughed and rolled over to him.

“Happy?”

“You were right, we did deserve a nice weekend at an expensive hotel.”

Hunter took his hand and threaded their fingers together.

“You should just accept that I’m right all the time,” he said.

“And where would the fun in that be?”

“Less time I have to spend convincing you that I am right, more time I have to suck you off.”

“Can’t argue with that sound logic,” Fitz replied. 

“We could even start right now,” Hunter said, other hand going to Fitz's waist for a second. “If you want.”

“If I ever turn down your mouth on my cock, you’ll know something is wrong with me,” Fitz said. Hunter pressed his hand into the length of Fitz’s cock through his jeans, teasing with the pressure and how he stroked to get Fitz hard. There was a careful method to how he worked, Fitz had seen it before, but every time, the time and care he took in touching Fitz astounded him. He didn’t deserve this attention. History had told him so, shown him so. He’d been locked away for being  _ wrong _ and separated from the one person who had loved him unconditionally. This thing that lived inside of him, these abilities only grew and changed, made him useful and easy to use, made him a target. It didn’t matter that beyond his abilities, he could build anything, fix anything, reconfigure and rewire anything. He was boiled down to his powers on evaluation. A tool to be deployed and used, a weapon to take out their enemies.

But somehow, despite all of that, Hunter still touched him like he mattered, like he was the only thing that did. Hunter took his time, running barely there pressure up and down the length of his cock, whispering dirty things into his skin, telling him how good he was going to feel, how amazing it was going to be when he took him apart. Fitz clung to that. 

“Hunter, please,” he begged, voice cracking. He needed it so bad.

“What do you want, love?”

“Your mouth,” he whined out.

“Where do you want my mouth? Here?” 

He kissed the underside of Fitz's jaw.

“Or here?”

Down the length of Fitz's throat.

“Maybe here?”

Onto the skin exposed by the first few buttons open on his button-down shirt.

Hunter worked at the rest, kissing the skin as it appeared, his other hand never leaving where he was stroking at Fitz's cock. 

“No,” Fitz managed.

“Tell me what you want, then.”

“I want your mouth on my cock. I want you to suck me off so good that I’ll feel your tongue and your hot wet mouth against me for hours.”

Hunter popped open the final button on his shirt and kissed just below his navel. 

“That wasn’t so hard, was it, love?”

He worked at the button and fly on Fitz's jeans without another word and tugged them down, boxers and all, just enough to let Fitz's cock swing free.

“There we go, that’s better,” Hunter said, and took no time to wrap his hand around him. Hunter never was extraordinarily patient, not enough to maintain teasing Fitz for too long. Fitz actually loved that about him, his excitement and his general fervor for life. 

He stroked slowly, keeping eye contact with Fitz, swiping his thumb over the head to use the  precum beaded there to slick the rest of him.

“Hunter,” Fitz said, voice high and reedy.

“I know, love. I’ll take care of you. Patience.”

But, not one to deny Fitz of his desires, Hunter wrapped his mouth around the head and teased him slowly, tongue dancing against him.

“Fuck,” Fitz groaned, unable to look away.

Lance Hunter was beautiful, Fitz had always thought so, but there was something otherworldly about him when he was sucking cock. Fitz ran his thumb over the edge of Hunter’s jaw to his mouth, teasing his lower lip a bit. He winked up at Fitz and darted his tongue down his shaft and out to lick at Fitz's thumb. 

“You’re a right bastard, you know,” he groaned, even as Hunter looked pleased as punch. “Fucking hell, Hunter. You’re so beautiful, you know that?”

Hunter bobbed his head to agree, sucking and lavishing Fitz with imperfect but teasing licks. 

“I –” Fitz was cut off by the trill of Hunter’s phone going off. Hunter lifted his head, letting Fitz go from his mouth still achingly hard and watching amused as his cock wobbled. “I thought you turned your phone off.”

“It’s on Do Not Disturb.”

“It’s clearly not working, then,” Fitz groaned. 

Hunter grabbed his phone from his jacket and sighed.

“It’s Bobbi, hold that thought.”

He rose off the bed and answered the phone.

“Bob, what is it?”

Fitz couldn’t hear the other side of the conversation so instead focused on undressing. He left his clothes in a heap at the foot of the bed and lay in the center of the mattress, feeling like some pampered royal from history. 

Lazily, watching Hunter have his disagreement with Bobbi, Fitz propped himself up against the pillows and stroked his cock slowly , slicked with Hunter’s spit . He kept his eyes on Hunter who shed his jacket as he paced, and when he turned to go back the way he came, their eyes met. And then, he paused, watching Fitz pass a thumb over his tip and then slide his hand back down, squeezing ever so slightly at the base. 

“I  gotta go,” Hunter managed, voice catching a little. 

He could tell Bobbi put up a fight at that.

“I took the weekend off, go see your girlfriends if you’re lonely. Don’t call unless it’s an emergency.”

He hung up the phone and tossed it away. 

“What do you think you are doing, Leopold Fitz?”

“What you’re neglecting to do yourself, Lance Hunter.”

Hunter climbed up onto the bed and then crawled over to Fitz.

“Sorry about that, then, love. Let’s pick up where we left off, which I believe was,” he said, trailing off as he settled between Fitz's spread legs and took his cock back in without an issue. 

“Fuck, god, I can’t wait to have you inside of me.”

Hunter glowed with satisfaction and pride, always so confident in his ability to turn Fitz on and get him off. Which, Fitz noted from behind the haze of pleasure starting to overtake his senses, he should be because he was damn good at it. 

“If I keep complimenting you, your ego won’t fit through the door, but  _ fuck _ , Hunter, your mouth is fucking magic, I swear.”

Hunter pulled off but kept stroking him in even, steady strokes.

“And all of this is just for you, baby.”

Fitz whined, curling his toes into Hunter’s sides, causing him to laugh a little at the tickling pressure. 

“I mean it,” Hunter continued, each stroke deliberate, kissing along the shaft with open-mouthed kisses. “I am all yours now, Leo. Doesn’t matter what happened before us, who we were or who we were with. From now on, I’m yours. Whenever, wherever you want me, I am so yours.”

Fitz threaded his fingers into Hunter’s free hand at his hip.

“I didn’t think you could make me love you more, but come up here, please, and kiss me.”

“I’m in the middle of something if you forgot.”

“Yeah, and I need to kiss you  _ right now _ .”

Hunter laughed and crawled up the length of Fitz’s body to kiss him. He slid his hand into Fitz’s curls and deepened the kiss, leaning into him. 

“I love you,” Fitz said. “I love you so much.”

“I love you,” Hunter said. “I would love you to show you by sucking you off, love.”

“Couple more minutes, let me keep kissing you.”

“Alright, I can do that.”

Hunter settled beside him, leaned his weight against him and kissed him slowly. 

“I am going to touch you, though, because you being naked and hard is too much for me to resist,” he added between kisses, hand disappearing from Fitz’s jaw and reappearing at his hip. “You’re too irresistible.”

Fitz tipped his head back just to let out a low groan, Hunter’s hand giving him the perfect pressure and friction. 

“Besides, you know you want to get off.”

“I want to spend as much time here in this moment as possible.”

“I’ll take care of you, Fitz.”

“I know.”

God, did he know. Hunter had done nothing but take care of Fitz. He tried to give back everything that he got, be as good for Hunter as he was for him, and never stop loving Hunter no matter what, doting on him. 

“Do you know how you can start?”

“If it’s suck you off, I’m going to murder you,” Hunter laughed.

“No, no, this is perfect. But you are wearing just a touch too many clothes.”

“Of course. Silly me.”

Hunter quickly sat up and stripped off his shirt first, and then his pants, wriggling his hips tauntingly at Fitz, putting on the show he knew so well how to do.

“You know, you don’t have to make a show of getting naked every time, right?”

“What? You’re not excited to see me naked? You don’t want to rejoice and celebrate all of this?”

“I absolutely want to celebrate all of this,” Fitz said, gesturing over his boyfriend’s frame. “But could we get all of this out faster? I want to touch you  _ now _ .”

“So impatient.”

“It’s all the love.”

Hunter laughed, and finally threw away his pants, his own cock hard and waiting for attention bowed up against his stomach. 

“Wonderful, come down here and fuck me, Hunter.”

“You are all over the place today.”

“I know, I’m weirdly anxious even though we’ve done this before, in, well, not places like this. And it’s more anticipation, or expectation. I just want to kiss you and touch you all over and have you inside of me and – I want all of it, Hunter, but I’d like you to come down here and kiss me breathless, please.”

“I can certainly do that. That would be my absolute pleasure.”

“And mine, I’m sure.” 

Hunter grinned, falling onto Fitz to kiss him with all the passion he had in him, hands in motion over his chest to his hips, dragging him back down the mattress so Hunter was straddled over his thighs, cocks brushing deliciously. 

“How do you want this today, Leo? On your back? On your hands and knees? On top, riding me?”

“Yes,” Fitz answered before his brain could actually form a real answer. “I mean, on my back. I want to see your face, feel your body against mine.”

“Perfect.”

He was rewarded with another kiss, Hunter holding his jaw to keep him still. 

“Mmm, I left the lube in my bag, hold on.”

Hunter climbed off of him, and stepped away for a moment. 

“Bobbi’s call threw you off your usual groove. Normally, you’d have me naked and your fingers inside me by now,” Fitz commented, taking his cock back up to stroke while Hunter fussed with the zipper on his suitcase. 

“Don’t make me punish you when I get back over there.”

“It was a statement of observation, that’s all.”

Hunter tossed the lube at him which Fitz fumbled over the edge of the bed  _ somehow _ .

“Your reflexes could still use some work,” Hunter commented. “Just a statement of observation.”

“Fuck off.”

Fitz clambered over to the edge of the bed, and reached for the lube on the floor. Hunter, cheeky shit that he was, pressed his body into Fitz’s back and dragged a nip over the curve of Fitz’s shoulder blade, his cock nestled right between Fitz’s legs. 

“This doesn’t seem right,” Hunter said. “This isn’t what you asked for.”

“Hunter,” Fitz laughed. “Get off, you cheeky  git .”

“Are you sure? I quite like it here.”

Fitz reached for the lube with his extended Manifested hand and swept it off the ground onto the bed by their sides, and then used it to push Hunter up just enough to turn onto his back underneath him.

“Oh, good use of magic hand,” Hunter praised.

Fitz pretended he wasn’t pleased at the compliment. Hunter, gracefully, didn’t mention it.

“Now, where were we?”

He shifted Fitz’s legs open so he could slot between them, kissing down Fitz’s neck again, tickling kisses.

“ Ahh , that’s right,” Hunter said as if Fitz had reminded him. He leaned in and pressed his mouth to the shell of Fitz’s ear to whisper, voice husky and sexy, “I was going to fuck you breathless.”

He breathed out and chuckled just to keep from moaning. 

“Yes, please.”

Fitz loved the way Hunter’s skin felt under his hands, the curves of his body, the warmth of him. There was nothing Fitz loved more than Hunter, how easy it was to be around him, how his body fit against his, how his humor kept Fitz buoyant, how Hunter’s aura kept him feeling alive. Fitz grabbed onto Hunter’s elbow.

“God, I love you.”

Hunter busied himself with the lube, still kissing wherever he could, and just as Fitz was going to sass him again for taking his time, Hunter pressed a finger into Fitz. 

“ _ Fuck _ ,” he hissed a little.

“That doesn’t hurt, does it?” 

“No, the lube is just ice cold.”

“Oh, does precious Leopold need his lube warmed up?”

“Fuck off.”

“I didn’t know you were such a pillow princess, love.”

“Yes, you did.”

Hunter laughed and kissed him quiet. He slowly worked Fitz open, one finger at a time, kissing over his face and telling him how good he was, how perfect, how tight. He worked towards pushing three fingers into Fitz easily, slicked fingers stretching him open. 

“Look how beautiful you are,” Hunter mumbled, kissing concentric circles into his skin. “You had to have been carved specifically by some deity.”

“Shut up,” Fitz groaned.

“You are,” Hunter insisted. “You’re wonderful, you’re beautiful, you open up for me so good. You’re a gift from the gods, Leopold.”

“Stop,” Fitz whined. 

“You’ll let me pamper you and pleasure you, but you will not be complimented, huh.”

“I don’t –”

“You don’t what?”

“I don’t deserve any of this, let alone you praising me for –”

He was cut off by Hunter pulling his fingers free and moving to hover over Fitz, looking him right in the eye.

“I want you to listen to me, Fitz. I have never met anyone like you, you know. I don’t put a lot of effort into relationships, or I haven’t historically. But you,  _ you _ make me want to try. You are worth so much more than I could ever give to you, but I am willing to try. You make me want to plan a surprise weekend at a nice hotel, because you deserve to be treated well. You make me want to be that kind of boyfriend, because you deserve that type of man.”

Fitz wanted to shy away, wanted to tell him to stop fooling around, but his face was so honest and loving that he couldn’t look away.

“I’m going to make such sweet love to you, Leo.”

“Lance,” Fitz said, and Hunter kissed him so sweetly. “You don’t have to –”

“I don’t have to,” Hunter agreed, “but I want to.”

“Okay.”

“I’m going to keep telling you for as long as you need to hear it.”

“Okay.”

Hunter kissed him again, and shifted back down his body to push his fingers back inside of Fitz. 

“I love you, Leo,” Hunter said, voice soft, gentle. 

“I love you, too.”

Hunter went back to working him open, even though he could take Fitz right then without a problem. Fitz would let him take his time all afternoon, his fingers curling just shy of Fitz’s prostate, teasing, ever teasing. When he whined out a please, Hunter intentionally brushed into it and Fitz bowed up into him with a pleased moan. This is exactly what he’d pictured the first time they’d had sex, laid out in a patch of warm sunshine. When he was satisfied, Hunter kissed the center of Fitz’s chest and pulled his fingers out again. 

“Ready?”

“Always.”

Hunter slicked his cock slowly, working his hand over himself while he watched Fitz readjust on the bed further into the patch of sunshine, letting the light warm his skin against the chilled hotel air conditioning. 

“You know,” Hunter said, but Fitz was more focused on the slide of his hand over his cock, the way he twisted it around the head, the little breath of air he let out in relief.

“What?”

“On a similar vein to what I was saying earlier, and I don’t know what this says about me or my relationships, but I’ve never had sex like this,” Hunter said. “Where I can get a phone call in the middle and it doesn’t ruin anything. Where we can laugh, and tease each other. It’s really fucking nice.”

“It is,” Fitz agreed. “You know of my lack of prior experience, so clearly this is great for me personally, but I’m also glad this can be special for you, too.”

“Every moment with you is special, Fitz, not just the ones where you’re naked.”

Fitz shifted again, getting comfortable, and Hunter moved to meet him. He didn’t take his eyes off of Fitz as he positioned himself, one hand steady on his hip while the other guided his cock to Fitz's entrance. He almost couldn’t breathe against the intimacy of the moment, staring up at this beautiful man he loved, in a space no one could bother them in, nothing to disturb them, nothing that demanded their attention. 

Hunter eased inside of him as if he were afraid to break him still, as if just last week he hadn’t fucked Fitz into the mattress so hard that there would have been bruises on most of his body if it hadn’t been for his regenerative abilities. But the last time Fitz had tried to hurry him, Hunter had made him wait even longer before he started, so Fitz just kept his eyes on Hunter and admired him.

The sunlight lit him up as if he were a god coming down from the heavens, the little hairs in disarray around his head glowing like a halo, his whiskey eyes mostly endless black pupil from his arousal but still bright as ever. He was looking at Fitz, too, and Fitz wondered idly what he saw, what Hunter focused on when he looked at him. He’d ask later, too intent on feeling everything, not questioning himself, or Hunter, or them together. 

“What are you thinking about?” Hunter asked, finally rooted fully inside of Fitz, pausing to rest there. He spoke softly, a whisper in their quiet room.

“The laws of thermodynamics,” Fitz replied, and Hunter pinched the back of his thigh playfully.

“Really, though.”

“You, of course. What else would I be thinking of this close to you fucking me?”

“The laws of thermodynamics, apparently,” Hunter quipped back.

Fitz reached out with his extended hand ability and pinched Hunter’s ass in response.

“No fair, no magic hands.”

Fitz brushed his magic hand down Hunter’s back, feeling his skin as if he were touching him physically, over the curve of his ass, and between his legs, Hunter jolting forward with a startled yelp as Fitz teased his balls a little.

“What’s the point of having a magic hand if we can’t have a little fun?” Fitz asked. 

“I’d definitely be okay with that, but not right now.”

“Later, then,” Fitz said, “I’ll get you off from across the room.”

“How long can you go?”

“All night, baby,” Fitz teased.

“I meant, how long can you use that power?”

“I never tested that, but we’ll find out.”

Hunter pulled out a bit and pushed back in, holding onto Fitz’s hips. 

“Baby,” Hunter cooed, leaning over to kiss him. “You good?”

“I’m so good.”

He moved slowly, withdrawing and pushing back into Fitz with a steady, patient precision, taking his time with Fitz. They could stay here forever, Hunter kissing over Fitz’s skin, his cock filling him up so good. 

“You can go faster,” Fitz said.

“Certainly could. The question is, do you want me to go faster?”

Fitz made a face at Hunter who took his sweet time pulling out of him until it was just the tip of his cock inside and then caught Fitz’s face in his hands to keep him steady, eyes locked as he pushed so slowly back in.

“You’re such a goddamn tease sometimes,” Fitz groaned. 

“As if you’re not, too.”

“I haven’t teased you at all today.”

“You literally were stroking yourself to tease me minutes ago.”

Fitz smirked at him.

“Okay, well, you’re still a tease.”

Hunter kissed him, sweetly, like he could tell him how much he loved him with just a kiss. 

“I’ll give you what you want,” Hunter said into his mouth. And fuck, he did. He started moving faster, thrusting easily and evenly, holding Fitz in place by his hips. “Goddamn, I will never get over how good you feel, love.”

All Fitz could do was whine high in the back of his throat, needy and wild, gripping Hunter’s forearms. 

“You’re okay,” Hunter muttered, moving his mouth to the pulse point at Fitz’s throat. “Relax, Leo.”

“I’m relaxed.”

“No, you’re not. Relax.”

He ran his hands down Fitz’s chest, massaging at his muscles, easing the tension from his body until he was loose and limp beneath him. 

“There, better,” Hunter stated. He fucked into Fitz effortlessly, grinning at him, making him feel soft and good and  _ loved _ . “Much better. You’re so beautiful.”

He wanted to tell Hunter that he was a wonder, that watching him was akin to staring at a masterpiece, that when Hunter touched him, there were fireworks under his skin, that when they were together, nothing could possibly harm Fitz as he was walking on fucking air. Hunter did that to him, made him feel buoyant, light, impossibly free. Nothing could drag him down when they were together. Hunter didn’t even have to be looking at him or touching him, just being near him, in the same room as him was enough. 

He couldn’t find the words.

Instead, he dragged Hunter down into him for a kiss, long and drawn out, unashamed, unabashed, desperate and aching. Hunter seemed to know what he meant though. 

“This good?” he asked, fucking into Fitz with just the right speed and angle, grazing over Fitz's prostate.

“Yeah,” Fitz breathed out, and caught the side of Hunter’s face in his hand. “Perfect.”

Time stretched out on either side of this moment, Hunter and Fitz locked together, tangled on top of the bedspread, falling ever so easily further in love with each other. They could stay here forever, forget the world, forget what it felt like to not be together, to be apart, to not be pressed flush to one another, them against the world. 

They didn’t have to talk, just looking into each other’s eyes was enough. 

Something unreal, unimaginable, indescribable wrapped around them, and Fitz never felt closer to anyone ever. He never wanted to. This was it. 

“Hey,” Fitz said. Hunter’s eyes had closed, his face slack, and Fitz reached up again, dragging him down closer. “Love, look at me.”

Hunter’s eyes came back to Fitz’s, and whatever this thing was solidified. 

Fitz could not tell you how long they were there, could have been hours and he wouldn’t have complained. 

When they came, it was together, curled into and clutched at one another, Fitz gasping out Hunter’s name, while Hunter groaned unintelligibly into Fitz’s neck.

Hunter unceremoniously collapsed onto Fitz after pulling out, kissing his collar where he could reach it as they breathed evenly

“Fuck, got my money’s worth already,” Hunter muttered.

“I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

“Thank you.”

“For the sex?”

“For everything. For thinking of this, for thinking of  _ me _ , and, we definitely needed this, needed to be away where no one could bother us. It’s nice to not have to worry about a mission coming in, or Coulson calling us for training or a Team Meeting.”

“Yeah,” Hunter agreed.

“Also, for the sex.”

Hunter laughed, and kissed right above Fitz’s thundering heart, then whispered sweetly, “I’ll do anything for you. Anything you want.”

Fitz couldn’t form the words, but he felt exactly what he meant. He felt it deep into his soul, even as he fell asleep with Hunter pressed up close to him.

* * *

After their weekend away, Fitz seemed lighter, which Hunter was glad for. It had been good just as a weekend off, with the sight-seeing and spending time at Fitz’s side, but seeing Fitz laugh and not worry about Void was nice. He had such a nice smile, and Hunter would do anything to see it.

“Hey, can I try something out with you?” Fitz asked.

“Oh, always, I’m into new stuff.”

“Down, boy. It’s nothing sexual. I was thinking about how I knew what Samantha was afraid of. I wanted to try and work on that, to see if I can expand that empathy power. If I can get control of it, I think I should be able to turn it down, or turn it off. Something. I want to try.” 

“Okay.”

Fitz sat Hunter down on the bed at one end and then sat  opposite of him at the other end so they weren’t touching. 

“I want you to focus on something really hard, on a memory with  a strong emotional resonance. I’d request something not explicitly sexual, unless there’s an emotional connection.”

“Sex with you always has an emotional connection,” Hunter pointed out, “but I’ve got something  else I can use.”

“Okay. Focus on it, please ; let it fill you up and  radiate out of you.”

“Like I do with my emotions for you sometimes?”

“Exactly,”  Fitz said, and Hunter adored the proud smile he gave Hunter in response. 

“Okay. Focusing.”

Hunter closed his eyes, even though Fitz hadn’t specifically requested that, and thought about the last time he saw his mum. She’d been baking all day, and their house smelled like sugar cookies and pastry. His dad had been there, grumbling about Hunter not being enough as usual, and his mum had rolled her eyes. He’d been nineteen, on leave from the army, and she had looked thinner than she’d ever looked.

“Try this,” she’d said, holding out a pastry for him to try. He’d willingly and happily eaten it with a smile.

“Cinnamon and ginger,” Fitz said out loud, startling Hunter. 

“What?”

Hunter opened his eyes  and found Fitz's eyes open and looking at him carefully. 

“She died a few months later,” Fitz breathed out. 

“Yeah, she’d apparently been sick and hadn’t told anyone. She didn’t want anyone’s pity.”

“ I didn’t know,” Fitz said. “I didn’t know it hurt that much still, Lance.”

“How’d you –”

“When we were in the field,  I knew where Samantha was, and I knew why she was so scared. She’d been put in a closet in the basement which was her punishment, and I knew she was afraid of the dark. So, I figured I  might be able to do it intentionally. But that’s not – why didn’t you tell me you lost your mum?”

Fitz crossed the bed on his knees and welcomed himself into Hunter’s lap. 

“I thought I had.”

Hunter  slid his hands up Fitz's sides and  then up the curve of his shoulder blades, drawing him closer until they were hugging. 

“ That memory is bittersweet. It was the last time I ever saw her, but she  was bright, and warm, and happy the way she always had been. She made me feel loved, and cherished, despite my dad’s attitude . She would have liked you a lot.”

Fitz let out a small noise, and Hunter stroked down his spine.

“I’m sorry for not asking before this. I’ve been so wrapped up in my problems, I’ve been a shitty boyfriend.”

“You have not been a shitty boyfriend.  I didn’t mean to hold anything back, but I don’t really talk about it. I didn’t get to say goodbye or apologize for being a terrible son, or  not calling more often. So, it hurts.”

Fitz lifted his head and kissed Hunter’s forehead slowly. 

“I won’t ask about it if you don’t want, and I’ll stay away –”

“No,  you ’re okay. I don’t want to hide from you.”

“I don’t want to hurt you,” Fitz said, voice small. 

“Oh, Fitz, you’ve never hurt me. You never will. I know you well enough to know you won’t. This is a hurt I live with, grief I carry, and it’s a good memory. I chose it for a reason. Here, let me show you.”

He focused  back on that weekend, the pastry he had, the sound of her laugh, the way his dad didn’t get on his case either. It had been so good, and Hunter had treasured it.

They’d had dinner, and she’d made Hunter’s favorite meal, which warmed him up still to think about. Fitz made a quiet noise in the back of his throat, the same noise he made during a good meal. It was cute, and Hunter remembered all over again why he’d been drawn to Fitz in the first place.

“Be safe, okay, love? You be safe, and you be good,” his mum had said as he was wrapping a scarf around his neck. 

“Be my firefly, okay?” Fitz said, and Hunter couldn’t help the noise he made himself, quiet and longing. “Firefly?”

“Light in the darkness,” Hunter explained. “It was just a thing between Mum and I.”

“We can keep it that way,” Fitz said and kissed the tip of his nose. “Thank you for sharing. I wish I had something to give you back, but I, I appreciate this, Hunter. I appreciate you telling me everything, especially if it hurts.”

“I’m all yours, remember? Everything. Light, dark, pain, pleasure, all of it, it’s yours,” Hunter murmured quiet enough no  one else would ever hear it, not even the walls. 

“ Me too,” Fitz said, and they were.

* * *

Fitz sat down next to Daisy and  didn’t say anything while she typed. He’d learned that unless she was actively looking at you, it was unlikely she was paying attention to you.  She finished the line of code she was working on and saved her work before looking at him.

“What’s up, duck?” she asked.

“ I had an idea,” he replied, and took a deep breath to steady himself. “I need you to hack the institution's records and find  some information.”

“Okay. I can do that. That’s definitely something I can do. What are you looking for?”

“Aubrey,” Fitz said. “They wrote meticulous notes about the experiments and our behavior, so I imagine they’d have documentation of where they sent her to, or what they did to her. I have to know if the void is Aubrey.”

“Okay. You’ve referred to it as the institution. What’s the actual name?”

“Clover Institution of Wellness.”

“Gross,” Daisy replied. “What a gross lie name. False advertisement. Hate it.”

Fitz laughed and watched Daisy work. It was always so satisfying to watch her work, her confidence and skill shining. 

“Okay, her name, Aubrey. Last name?”

“No idea.”

“Okay. Let’s try this, girls named Aubrey during the years you were there.”

“Try from 1992, actually,” Fitz corrected. “She’d been there since she was six.”

“Oh, early bloomer,” Daisy said. “I can’t imagine Manifesting as a child and having powers during puberty.”

“Yeah, it fucking sucked,” Fitz said.

“Right,” Daisy said, and gave him a sympathetic smile. “Did your first boner cause any flares of your abilities?”

“No, my first orgasm did, though.”

“Really?” Daisy stopped typing to look at him. “What was that like?”

It was weird to talk about this, except it wasn’t because it was Daisy. Before Daisy, he might not have told anyone, not even his partner, but between Daisy’s infectious lack of shame and Hunter’s unwavering curiosity, he was willing to. 

“It was actually after I got out of the institution, and I was at the academy. Before, I didn’t have much of a sex drive, and no one I fancied like that, so it was the first time I felt safe, and I – okay, there was this really beautiful set of twins who lived in the dorms with us, and I fancied them a lot.”

“Oh, baby’s first fantasy,” Daisy cooed.

“Yeah,” Fitz laughed. “I had my orbital field power at that point, and during that first experience, all of the objects around me were floating. It was, it was weird.”

“I actually broke my bedframe from quaking it apart during my first orgasm after I Manifested.”

“Did you really?”

“Yeah, that was embarrassing.”

“The first time I did anything with Hunter, I Manifested and shoved Hunter into a wall.”

“I didn’t know what!”

“It was filed officially as  _ personal relations _ , but you know,” Fitz said with a shrug.

“Was he naked? Were you in the middle of going to pound town?”

“No, we were still clothed, and we were just making out.”

“Was that all?”

“Well, he did stick his leg between mine,” Fitz said.

“Oh! I see.”

Fitz blushed and she suggestively nudged him.

“Is he as good in bed as Bobbi says he is, though? I’ve been dying to know.”

“You talk about your exes with Bobbi?”

“Of course, I do. Don't you talk about your past with Hunter?”

“I do, but I don’t have a lot of sexual partners before Hunter, and I’m not sure I want to hear about what he got up to before me. It’s enough that he’s with me now. And yes, he’s very good in bed.”

“Good. You deserve that.”

“Thanks,” he said as she turned back to the screen to continue. “I’m glad we were brought together on this team. You’re one of my best friends.”

“You’re mine, too,” she said softly and leaned over to kiss his cheek. “Okay. Focus. Aubrey.”

“Aubrey.”

There was quiet between them while Daisy worked.

“Aubrey Small,” Daisy said finally and pulled up a file. There was Aubrey’s intake photo, a little six-year-old girl with wild brown curls and the sheen of tears in her brown eyes. “Intake date, February 12 th , 1992. Telekinetic. Says here that she was signed over by a – gross, as a ward of the state, she was placed here by a social worker. She was deemed a danger to herself and others, so they placed her in the facility to manage her abilities. There’s a lot of disciplinary notes, and – Jesus, that’s – okay.”

“What?”

“There’s a list of procedures they performed on her.”

“Yea, that makes sense. I’m sure mine’s a mile long.”

She made a noise and leaned into him.

“She was transferred out in 1998, to a more secure part of the facility, nicknamed the Garage. She was never released according to this, but she did Manifest again a few years ago, what the notes describe as an intense telepathy and mental shield.”

“Explains why I can’t read her emotions.”

“And why she could speak into our minds. Why could she look like the other girls though?”

“Maybe there’s a secret Manifest?”

Daisy shook her head, and he knew she was right.

“They did keep meticulous notes. Maybe her intense telepathy works similar to your hallucination ability, where she can make us see what she wants us to see, including a little girl where there wasn’t before.”

“Maybe.”

She reached out and took his hand, letting him sit in the moment, quiet in their seats. They brushed shoulders, and Fitz leaned into her space, let her presence, her calm, her understanding. 

“We’ll figure it out,” Daisy said in the quiet hum of the room. “We always do.”

* * *

“Get in, get out, that’s the mission. Get in, get the data, and you get out,” Coulson said as they touched down at an airfield outside of town. May called out an all clear. “Don’t get caught.” 

“Wasn’t exactly my goal,” Fitz said as he and Simmons stood and headed for the loading bay. “But since Dad says don’t get caught, I might just do it out of teenage rebellion.” 

“I can hear you,” Coulson said. 

“I know.”

Coulson rolled his eyes at Fitz, and Fitz followed Simmons to the loading bay. 

“ Comms check,” Daisy said as Fitz and Simmons climbed into the car, Simmons taking the driver’s side. 

“All good on this side,” Fitz said.

“Loud and clear,” Simmons said.

“Everything coming in clear on this side, too. Be safe, you two. Come back in one piece. Separately, one piece. Don’t get spliced into a single piece.”

“That would certainly make date nights awkward,” Fitz said.

“I’d gladly go on a date with Fitzsimmons,” Daisy said with a chuckle. “A literal Fitzsimmons.”

“I don’t know if I could handle dating three people at once,” Fitz said. “I don’t have that kind of attention span.”

“I think you’d like it,” Daisy said. “I certainly do.”

“Okay, can the chatter,” Coulson said. 

“Yes, sir,” Simmons said into the  comms , giving Fitz a look. 

“Your girlfriend started it, not me.”

They drove, following the GPS to the office building they suspected Hydra had set up as a cover. They’d been following leads on Hydra to see if they could get into their network, something even Daisy couldn’t locate, and find out how many Manifested they’d taken. Fitz, in particular, wanted to find Aubrey; he had to know if the Void was the girl he’d lost. 

“Fitzsimmons,” May’s voice came over the  comms . “Heads up, there has been reports of an increased security presence. I’m routing Hunter and Bobbi to meet up with you.”

“Thanks May,” Fitz said.

“Use caution, okay? We’re not sure what they’re guarding in there,” May said, and Fitz couldn’t stop himself from smiling a little bit. She wasn’t overly sentimental, or overtly affectionate, but May showed that she cared in other ways. 

“I will. I’ll be safe.”

“You call Bobbi and Hunter in if they need any help at all, do you understand me?”

“I will. I understand.”

She clicked off the  comms and Fitz glanced over at Simmons. 

“Okay, are you ready?” Simmons asked. 

“As ready as I’m ever going to be, I think.”

“You know if we need to, we can back out and they’ll send Mack and Yo-Yo in to handle this.”

“I don’t need to back out. I can handle this, and I need people to realize that. I’m a field agent just as much as anyone else on the team, and I’m not going to explode.”

“I know that,” she said. “I do know that. I just, I’m the one that wanted this, right? I wanted to have the team camaraderie, and I wanted to leave the lab for something new, and you, you just came along because you’re a good friend, and the best partner I could ever ask for. But if you can’t handle it, or don’t want to either, we don’t have to stay on the team. SciTech would take us back in a heartbeat, and give us our labs back, everything. We always have going back as an option.”

“No, I’m good where I am. Our friends are here. Hunter’s here. Your girlfriends are here.”

“Yeah, it is a nice little home we’ve made for ourselves here.”

He nodded. 

Hunter and Bobbi met them in a parking lot nearby, and Fitz willfully did not kiss Hunter, but he wished he could. 

“Hey,” Bobbi said. “So, this got a bit more complicated. We did a drive-by look-see, and that place is crawling with armed guards.”

“What’s in there?” Simmons wondered out loud.

“Certainly more than some computer servers,” Hunter replied. “You’re both wearing tact vests, right?”

“Yeah,” Fitz said, unzipping his windbreaker to show the tact vest he’d put on before they’d left. Hunter reached out and touched the vest with a nod. “I’ll be okay.”

“I know,” Hunter said. “There seems to be a gap in the guard schedule. We should be able to get in through that loading dock during that window.”

“Are you sure?” Simmons asked.

“I’m sure.”

“Okay, once we’re inside, it’s better if we split up. Fitzsimmons, head for the servers, Hunter and I will see if we can figure out what’s going on.”

“Please be safe,” Fitz said quietly to Hunter. Hunter pulled him close by the front of his jacket and kissed him. “I won’t forgive you if you get hurt.”

“Yes, you will,” Hunter said, voice light with teasing.

“I’ll be very cross, then.”

“I can handle that.”

When they stepped away from each other, they put on their professional faces. Fitz reached out and took Simmons’ hand, and found her steady belief in him and their team. It was soothing.

“Okay, here we go,” Hunter said.

They headed for the loading docks at the back of the office building and managed to slip inside undetected.

“Be safe,” Bobbi muttered to Simmons as they parted. 

Fitz caught Hunter’s eyes and he nodded in response, pushing a soft pride into his aura. It was enough. Hunter and Bobbi headed one direction, and Fitz with Simmons the other towards where the schematics they’d found said the server rooms would be. 

Fitz tracked  Hunter’s calm as far as he could while paying attention to his path with  Simmons, wanting to have his location narrowed down in case anything happened. 

“Okay, should be through here,” he said, though, focusing on the task at hand. He took out the small device he’d packed in his bag that unlocked  doors, and set it against the locking mechanism. It ran the code against the electronic lock and  the door buzzed as the lock released. They stepped inside and  found a massive room of servers. Fitz got to work, heading to the diagnostic  terminal and plugging in. He wasn’t as good a hacker as Daisy, but he could hold his own, especially with a direct hook-up to the system. “Let’s see what they’re hiding.”

“I wonder what it is,” Simmons said quietly. “Or who.”

“What?”

“The thing that’s in the building, the reason for all the guards.”

“I don’t know,” Fitz replied. “I’d rather not think about it, personally.”

“Are you afraid its Aubrey?”

“A little bit. I don’t know what I’d do, you know, if I actually faced her. How do I tell her that I’m sorry for something I didn’t actually do? I was a kid. I shouldn’t have been promising anyone anything, but I wanted to help her.”

“You were ten,” Simmons said gently. 

“ I know that,” Fitz said, looking at the  computer instead of  at Simmons. “I just thought  that I could help her. Even when I flared back then, no one got hurt. Well, no one except for me.”

“You are someone,” Simmons corrected.

“Yeah, I know that.”

He tapped his  comms and said to Daisy, “okay, I’ve got direct access. Ready to begin upload.”

“I’ve got your connection nice and strong, Fitz. Send them on through when you’re ready.”

Fitz worked on that first, starting the file transfer.

“Everything okay?” Daisy asked.

“As okay as it can be standing in the middle of a highly guarded Hydra office.”

“That makes sense. How large is this file?”

“Not terribly small, honestly. Might be a moment.”

“Well, we expected that. Can you do me a little favor while you wait?”

“Now?”

“Yeah, I’m going to walk you through a small hack. There’s something I want to see.”

“Okay.”

Together, Fitz and Daisy worked through their files until they found a list of Manifested who they were monitoring.

“Look for the name  Jiaying , please,” she said.

“That’s your mum, right?” Fitz asked, bringing up a query and searching for  Jiaying as directed.

“I need to know if she’s in danger, especially being one of the first Manifests in recorded history.”

“Makes sense.”

He brought up her file, and skimmed through.

“She is on their interest list. Because of her regenerative abilities, they marked her a priority as a subject for study if possible.”

“That’s disgusting,” she replied. 

Fitz closed the file and sent it with the rest of the upload for Daisy to review herself. Then, unable to stop himself, or his errant curiosity, he looked up his own name and opened the file labeled “Leopold J Fitz: subject 65712b”.

There was a photo of Fitz when he was ten, scrawny and blonde and scared, wearing the uncomfortable, ill-fitting grey t-shirt and sweatpants the institute supplied. 

“Is that you?” Simmons asked, stepping up to the terminal beside him. “You look terrified.”

“I was,” Fitz replied. “I was taken from my mum, my country, my life.”

He stopped to read the file.

** Leopold J Fitz: subject 65712b **

** Date of Birth: 8/19/1987 **

** Date of Manifestation: 9/28/1997 **

** Intake Date: 9/29/1997 **

** Guardian Sign Off on File: Y **

** Worth at Intake: 9,350 **

“Worth?” Simmons asked.

“Paid to Alistair T Fitz. It’s the amount they paid for  _ me _ .”

“That’s disgusting.”

“I don’t know if I’m surprised, though.”

** Date of Last Manifestation: 7/8/2003 **

** Updated Manifest Abilities as of 7/9/2003: fire manipulation, empathic senses, invisibility, psychic persuasion, energy manipulation, orbital field telekinesis, vocal mimicry, reality manipulation **

** Power Level at Last Evaluation: 4 **

** Main Attendant’s Notes: **

** 10/19/2003 - subject was acquired by SHIELD, we will continue to monitor is progress **

** 7/9/2003 - subject continues to Manifest new abilities at an astounding rate, despite all tests and attempts to suppress, or inhibit his abilities. Subject’s most recent Manifestation follows continued pattern of alternating between physical and mental abilities. We will continue to monitor and document subject. **

** 5/1/2003 - subject gave samples of blood, urine, saliva, spinal fluid, hair, tissue, and follicles. We are hopeful this will lead to some understanding of the subject, and his continued Manifest **

** +Supplemental – subject is lethargic following donations, irritable and lashing out at nurses and attendants **

** 5/1/2003 - subject scheduled for partial vivisection later this afternoon, seems to be resistant **

“That explains the scar,” Fitz said out loud, touching a faint scar on his chest. “I don’t remember that.”

There was a long list of procedures and notes stating that  Fitz was either violent or nonresponsive after. 

“Vivisection, electroconvulsive therapy, bone marrow and blood donations at an almost dangerous rate. This is  _ barbaric _ ,” Simmons said, voice full of disgust. “They should have their medical licenses revoked.”

“I don’t remember,” Fitz said. “I don’t remember any of it. I thought – we were testing inhibitors, not – not this.”

He closed the file, unable to look at it any longer, but sent it in the queue of files to Daisy. 

“I’m sending you my file,” he said to Daisy. “I don’t know what to do with it, but I’d prefer it be in our hands instead of Hydra’s.”

“Okay. The upload is nearly complete. Feel free to wipe the system when that finishes. You remember the master key password?”

“Hard to forget.”

He opened the master key from the USB drive he’d plugged in and waited  to enter the key. 

_ “Okay, Leopold, we’re going to be numbing the area, but not sedating you. We don’t want to have any adverse reactions to the anesthesia,” the nurse with the big curls and long eyelashes said.  _ _ Leopold _ _ could taste his heartbeat. “You relax. It’ll be over soon.” _

“Fitz,” Simmons said, snapping him back to the present. “Hey. The key.”

“Right,” he said, swallowing thickly. “The key.”

His hands shook as he typed out  JammyDodgers&DaisyRulez ! as the key.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I just, I don’t remember,” Fitz said, voice warbling in the middle. “I don’t remember being vivisected.”

“I suspect that is because you blocked it out. That’s such a horrific thing to do. It’s absolutely horrendous that they would do such a thing, and in the name of science. Even Doctor Moreau would be disgusted at cutting into a human being like that.”

“Yeah,” Fitz said. “I suppose you’re right. I must have just, just blocked it out.”

“Oh, Fitz,” Simmons said, touching his shoulder. She was supposed to be watching the door, but Fitz had a good enough sense of people coming that she didn’t need to. “Are you okay?”

“I don’t know. We just need to get out of here as soon as we can so I can have a breakdown about this somewhere else,” Fitz said. “You know, that would be embarrassing. I don’t need some Hydra goon stepping in here and finding me having a panic attack about something that happened fifteen years ago.”

“It’s not embarrassing, especially because you didn’t even know it happened until five seconds ago. No one compartmentalizes that quickly.”

“I bet Ward does.”

“Well, the jury’s still out on whether or not Ward is human some days.”

That, at least, made Fitz laugh. 

“Look, this is some, some  _ stuff _ but you’ll be okay. I believe in you.”

“Thanks, I think.”

The terminal chirped quietly, signaling the end of the wipe, and just as Fitz was getting ready to pull the drive from the terminal, an alarm started up immediately afterward, loud and jarring.

“Okay, time to go,” Fitz said. “Super time to go.”

“What’s going on?” Bobbi asked into the  comms . “Did you set off an alarm?”

“Wiping their system seems to have triggered something, yeah.”

“We didn’t find anything that might – Hunter?”

Fitz couldn’t stop himself from bolting out of the server room and towards where he’d last clocked Hunter’s aura without thinking. 

“Fitz!” Simmons called, but Fitz kept going. 

_ “Where were you going?” the nurse with the big curls and long eyelashes asked as two of the orderlies lifted Leopold off the ground. He didn’t weigh much, especially since he’d started refusing meals. “Where do you even have to go?” _

Anywhere is better than here _ , he thought to himself.  _

_ “Take him to the education chair,” the doctor with the coke bottle glasses and the yellowed mustache said from nearby. “We’ll see if we can train this out of him.” _

Fitz stalled, unable to breathe. 

“Fitz!” Simmons said, catching up and grabbing his arm. “We have to go.”

“But Hunter –”

“Hunter is a trained field agent with Bobbi at his side. He’ll be okay.”

“I don’t – I have a feeling.” Simmons sighed and gripped his hand. “How can I leave?”

“We’ll call in back up.”

He nodded, and focused on the car they’d left not long before. When they landed, she smiled at him and let go of his hand. As soon as he could, he let his power pull him back to the previous spot. 

“I have to find him,” he said to Simmons over the  comms . “I can’t leave if he’s in danger.”

Hunter, as if called on cue, skidded out of a room in front of Fitz, lip split and a bruise blooming on one cheek. He radiated panic, mild but enough that Fitz paused in his steps.

“Oh! Fitz! What are you – you should get out of here, babe. There’s an alarm.”

“Yeah, caused it.”

Fitz put his hand on Hunter’s shoulder, and Hunter reached up to grip his forearm.

“Bobbi and I got split up.”

“I see that.”

“You should go, I’ll –”

There was a noise, and Hunter turned.

“We should go, actually.”

He nudged Fitz back the way he came and they started towards the exit. Something tickled in the back of Fitz’s head, and he turned his attention away from Hunter a moment. Down a hallway they passed, Fitz saw a tall, brunette woman staring at him. 

_ She was scrawny, and had a gap between her two front teeth, and she shared her pudding with Leopold.  _

_ “You promise?” she asked. _

_ “I promise _ .”

“Aubrey?” he said.

“What? No, it’s definitely still Hunter,” Hunter replied, tugging him down the hallway by his elbow.

“Leopold,” a voice that chilled every molecule in Fitz’s body said. 

_ “I’m so glad you’re going to be joining us, Leopold. We’re interested in your journey, and want you to feel at home here at the Clover Institution of Wellness,” the doctor with the coke bottle glasses and the yellowed mustache said. Leopold hated him immediately, even if his voice was honeyed. His eyes betrayed the kindness he was trying to project, calculating and unforgiving. Leopold wanted to go home, back to his mum and his school and his friends. He didn’t want to be here with the doctor and the nurse. “We’re going to learn so much from one another.” _

“Fitz,” Hunter said. 

“Leopold, it’s so nice to see you again.  I’ve been curious about your  progress since we lost you.  That was such a shame, don’t you think? We were so close to a breakthrough with you, and you were snatched away. We won’t be making that mistake again. Guards.”

As if from nowhere, several armed guards  surrounded them.

“It’s definitely time to get out of here. Fitz,” Hunter said, holding out his hand. 

“Leopold. Stay,”  the doctor said.

_ “Leopold. Stay.” _

_ Leopold stopped in place, held against his will, his body locking up and his mind fighting against it.  _ _ He wanted to run, wanted to scream, wanted to break free. He was frozen just by the sound of the doctor’s voice.  _

_ “Good.  _ _ Thank you, Gwen.” _

_ Leopold looked around  _ _ frantically with his eyes but couldn’t turn his head. He didn’t see anyone else in the room, but someone else could be watching through the observation window or standing behind him. He was exposed and vulnerable and frozen.  _

_ “Now,  _ _ sit still. This is delicate work.” _

_ He couldn’t even open his mouth to scream as  _ _ the doctor cut into his arm. _

“Fitz!”  Hunter’s voice was distant, panicked, a sharp pick of panic and concern jabbing Fitz in the temple but Fitz couldn’t move.

“Take him somewhere else. Unless he Manifests, dispose of him. He is of no use to me,” the doctor  said over his shoulder. Fitz could see Hunter  being dragged away, kicking and fighting back, but Fitz couldn’t move. He’d been told to stay. “ Did you like the mystery I dangled in front of you, Leopold? You’ve always had a curious mind. You’ve always wanted a puzzle to figure out.  I put Aubrey in front of you and you went careening into danger, right into my lap. Did you like that performance? We almost wasted her potential but she Manifested her second and third ability within  days of your little pact and it was too good of an opportunity.”

When he reached for his abilities, they felt dull inside him, vacant. Instead,  Fitz pictured  clawing the doctor’s eyes out with his fingers and prayed hard that  something would happen. If he concentrated  hard enough, maybe something would happen, something more than his body frozen in place while the love of his life was dragged away. 

“Now, come along, Leopold, we’ve got a lot of work to do, and I’ve had many ideas in our time apart.”

* * *

They brought Hunter to the most stereotypical bad guy torture room he’d ever  seen, bound his hands and  feet, and strung him up by a hook overhead so his feet didn’t touch the ground. They’d taken his  vest, his weapons, and his shoes. What kind of villains take a man’s shoes? 

It didn’t matter what they did to him, though. Fitz was out there somewhere in the hands of  psychopaths, and God knows what they were doing to  _ him _ . He’d frozen in place at the sound of his name, and Hunter couldn’t budge him as if held  in place.  Magically, Hunter would almost say. 

Fitz had said that no  worker was Manifested, but Fitz had been a child in pain and scared. He might have been mistaken, creating an Us vs  Them.

But if the void was Aubrey, then Hunter could also guess that maybe the staff had  employed, or forced Manifested to help them with rowdy patients. 

Either way, Fitz was in danger and Hunter couldn’t help. He was suspended by his wrists in a dingy, windowless room without any shoes. The guards who had dragged him away smiled creepily at him as they unrolled a packet of tools and weapons. 

Hunter had been through this before, but he wasn’t sure what kind of information they’d be looking for. Information on other Manifested, maybe, or maybe information on SHIELD. Information on Manifested inside of SHIELD.

Information on Fitz?

He’d rather die than give up anything that might hurt Fitz in some way. 

The largest of the guards chose  his bare fists, punching Hunter right in the stomach.  He had endured worse, a trained  soldier to not give any information up no matter what, and he wasn’t just doing this for SHIELD. He was doing this for Fitz, and Bobbi, and Daisy, and Yo-Yo, every  member of his team who could be compromised if he said anything. That was more important to him than the organization.  SHIELD could fall, and as long as Hunter’s team was okay, he was okay. 

* * *

Fitz followed as instructed into a surgical theater and nearly vomited from the sight of he hadn’t been instructed only to follow. As they’d walked, a  woman a few years older than him had stepped out. She  had an inhibitor collar around her neck, the light at the lock off meaning she could use her powers, but she’d been trained not to unless commanded. He’d heard stories about the collars before and after leaving the institution. They were horrific, and Fitz was disgusted that they even existed. He could probably build something that might counterattack the collar, some kind of jammer that worked on the same frequency as the collar. Maybe something handheld, and fit in his pocket so he could just nonchalantly reach in and turn off the collars, freeing every Manifested in the building. 

A localized EMP could work the same way, actually.

“Leopold,” the doctor said, ”please lay on the operating table so we can complete your exam.”

Fitz couldn’t help himself from obeying, the woman’s power urging him. 

_ “Leopold. Lay on the operating table and do not move, please.” _

_ “I don’t want to,” Leopold had argued, feeling a tremor start through him.  _

_ “Do not make me use force, Leopold. You know that doesn’t make me very happy.” _

_ Leopold looked at the orderly nearby who had his arms crossed across his chest. He was massive compared to Leopold, and was able to lift Leopold over his head without even really trying.  _

_ “Go,” the orderly said, and Leopold went.  _

“Now, I wonder what kind of abilities you went and got yourself while you were away. Leopold, sit still while we adjust your restraints.”

* * *

Hunter kicked at the guard closest to him, and realized as he missed, his shoulders aching with the weight of his body moving, that that was why they’d taken his shoes. He wore boots, so if he’d managed to catch one of them in the side, it might give him an advantage. 

“You heard the doctor,” one of the guards said, “if he doesn’t Manifest something, we get rid of him. I say, let’s skip the waiting, and get rid of him now.”

“If he’s a Manifested, we’ll see soon. If not, we’ll do it your way,” another one said. 

“Come closer, I’ll show you my Manifest,” Hunter grumbled. “You’re going to like it. It’s real neat.”

That comment got him a bunch to the gut. He brought his knee up sharp into the guard’s ribs in revenge, happy to give back something at the very least. The guard in return punched Hunter hard in the groin, and he couldn’t even curl up and keel over. The pain radiated out, and he let out a long, slow breath to keep from vomiting. He’d never vomited while strung up by his wrists, and he didn’t want to find out how that worked. 

“Not so tough now, huh, smartass?”

The second Hunter got out of these restraints, they were going to regret ever hearing the word Hydra. He was going to tear down this little dingy room using the hook he was suspended from, and then he was going to raze the rest of the building to the ground. He was going to find Fitz, and they were going to the middle of Utah or Michigan, some place Hydra would never think to look for them. 

God, he was so  worried about Fitz. Even if Fitz was  super powerful,  he wasn’t field trained and that was dangerous. Fitz was  everything wonderful in the world and Hunter couldn’t handle it if something  happened to him. He wanted Fitz safe and whole and surrounded  by big, strong  SHIELD agents who wouldn’t let  anything happen to him. He shouldn’t have let anything happen to  him in the first place.

“I hope you haven’t lost your  spark already, soldier,” one of the guards taunted, and Hunter growled at him,  pulling himself up and kicking at the next guard stupid enough to  come close.

“Careful, ” Hunter  said, “ I have  plenty of  that. It’s a never ending  well.”

“Oh,” the man said, “I hope so.”

* * *

_ “Leopold, can you  _ _ using try your power again?” the nurse with the big curls and the long eyelashes asked.  _

_ He was tired, and achy, and wanted to take a nap. _

_ “Leopold, I need you try.” _

_ He wanted to sleep so bad. _

“Leopold, I need you to wake up.”

“No,” he grumbled.

“I need you to wake up,” the voice said again. 

He hurt all over, and his head was swimming, his ears were ringing. He wanted to sleep so bad.

_ “Leopold. If you do not sit still, you will be punished.” _

_ “I can’t.” _

_ “Sit. Still.” _

_ The pain coursed through him, electricity jumping from cell to cell, burning a path into his nerve endings. He couldn’t breathe. _

He startled, couldn’t breathe, he was on fire. He couldn’t remember where he was, didn’t know how many days had passed, how many years. He’d been here forever, he was sure. 

“Leopold.”

He murmured.

“ _ Leopold _ ,” the voice snapped. 

He opened his eyes, one slow blink at a time. When he opened his eyes, he was in the back of a van, and the doctor with the coke bottle glasses and yellowed mustache, hovered over him. 

“Welcome back to the world,” he said. 

“Let me go,” Fitz murmured. 

“Oh, Leopold. We will.”

The doctor took out a syringe and a small vial of slightly viscous, clear liquid. 

“Now, you just relax, sit still, and be a good boy.”

* * *

Hunter ached, but he could still stand. They dragged him off the hook with a chuckle, and a taunting “we’ve got a show for you.” They dragged him through building and into a van with no windows. As if having bindings around his wrists and no shoes on his feet wasn’t bad enough, one of the guards punched him hard in the jaw as they got in to disorient him. 

“Good luck,” one of them hissed as they slammed to a stop. They opened the door and pushed him out into the parking lot at a local park. He was shoved to his knees on the asphalt, and then they were gone, tires squealing. Slowly, he worked at the ropes binding his wrists, chafed raw from being suspended from them, as he followed the sounds of panic and hysteria across the park. The gravel underneath his feet scraped, but he was trained for this. Parents clutching their kids to their chests and hips ran past him, their faces scared. 

Then, he stepped into a clearing where picnics and games of football were typically played, and froze. 

Simmons was standing just outside of a dome of power, fire and energy swirling endlessly around a figure Hunter could barely make out. But somehow, he knew. 

Fitz was in there. 

He dashed to her side, catching her wrist. 

“What’s going on?” 

“I don’t know! He was looking for you, and then he was gone, and then we got a heads up about a supernova flare in the park, but – I’ve never seen him like this. I have to calm him down.” 

He squeezed her wrist before she could step forward towards it. 

“And you’re sure that’s Fitz in there? That it’s not a trick?” 

Even as he said it, he knew the answer. Of course, it was Fitz in there. He could see all of the physical powers Fitz had Manifested in the dome, the fire and the force and the draining energy. 

“It’s Fitz.” 

He nodded and let her go. She stepped forward. 

Hunter wanted to pull her back, protect her from harm, but Fitz needed her. 

“Fuck,” Simmons cursed as she tried to step into the dome of swirling fire and wind and force that surrounded Fitz, buffeted back by the power. Hunter could see where her skin was burned along her arm angry and red. “He’s never done that before.” 

“He must be so scared,” Hunter said. “He hasn’t lost control like this before, has he?” 

“Not since we’ve been together,” Simmons answered. “And never anything like this.” 

He could hear Fitz’s anguished screams from inside the dome, barely visible behind the wall, and he took an unintentional, instinctual step towards Fitz. 

“Hunter, you can’t,” Simmons argued, catching his arm. “If this is what happened to me, you’ll be ripped apart.” 

“He won’t hurt me,” Hunter stated, pulling his arm back. 

“He doesn’t have a choice right now. You said it yourself, he’s not in control.” 

“I don’t know how to explain it but even out of his mind, Fitz would never hurt me. I’ve got to try. If he doesn’t calm down, someone’s going to alert the Administration and they’ll cart him off to be sedated for the rest of his life where we can’t get to him. I have to try, Simmons. He’d do the same for me.” 

Simmons looked like she wanted to argue, but didn’t. Instead, she said, “I’ll be right here if you need me.” 

“Always, love,” he said, leaning in to kiss her cheek. “Wish me luck.” 

He reached out towards the dome keeping them apart, and when his fingertips met it, they passed through without effect, without pain. Simmons made a little noise, but Hunter didn’t have time to gloat. Instead, he dashed through the shell around his boyfriend and towards him. Passing through didn’t hurt, but he felt the effects of it all pass through him, like walking through a ghost, cold and foreign. 

Fitz was crumpled to his knees, his hands up in his hair, pulling at the strands, his face scrunched in pain as he cried, his voice not entirely his own. He flashed in and out of view, his form affected by his invisibility. Hunter rushed to him and fell to his own knees in front of him. 

“Fitz, love, look at me.” 

He didn’t seem to hear him. 

“Please, baby, it’s okay. I’m here. Look at me.” 

Hunter had never been afraid to touch Fitz, always running his fingers over some part of Fitz’s body, even before they’d started dating. He loved the way his skin felt, the way his body curved, the angles, the lines of it all. 

Now, his hand shook as he reached out and clasped his hand around Fitz’s wrist. 

“Leo,” he said, and Fitz’s eyes cracked open, the cries quieting to whimpers, his eyes almost entirely black. “I’m here with you. See, I’m right here, I’m okay. You’re okay. Come back to me.” 

“I’m scared, Lance,” Fitz croaked out. “I can’t stop.” 

“You can,” Hunter assured him. “Just focus on me, okay. Focus on us here in this moment.” 

He’d done the same thing for Bobbi when they’d first bonded, talking her down, talking her powers back into control, just talking. He was good at it. He was good at talking if nothing else, always had been, talking himself into trouble and back out of it again, and if Fitz needed that, he was going to keep talking until he went hoarse. 

“Feel my hand on your arm,” he said. “Hear my voice. Focus on that. Us. Together. I’m going to move closer, okay? Tell me if it’s too much, too fast. Anything. Just tell me. I’ll stop. You know that, though, love.” 

“Don’t let go.” 

“Never. I told you, you’re mine now. Can’t get rid of me.” 

Hunter shuffled across the grass on his knees until he was in Fitz’s space. 

“You know, I think I accidentally bonded to you,” Hunter said conversationally, “which is stunning, and also a very me thing to do, don’t you think. Just living my life and break the rules of what we think is possible just by loving you so much. Clearly, the people who decided the rules of one Manifested to one Handler have never met us, because I would do anything for you, and I’d do anything for Bobbi. No one else, of course, everyone else is on their own, but I’d walk through fire for you, Leo. Which I literally just did.” 

He kept talking, sliding his hands up to cover Fitz’s and slowly relax his hands to let go of his hair. Fitz was still breathing heavy, and shaking, but his eyes were open and clearing of the black, and he was listening. He only flickered invisible once or twice. That was a good sign at least. 

“Hey, do you remember that date we went on when we were in New York?” he asked softly. “How we went to the Met and this guy was hitting on you, telling you that you were a work of art, and you burned his hand when he put it on your back.” 

“Yeah.” 

“And you almost set his sleeve on fire because you were flustered.” 

“Yeah,” Fitz repeated. 

“Can you pull the fire back in, Fitz? Remember how I put myself between you and him, and told him to back off. Remember that, that you’re in control still, that you’re still capable of pulling that power back in even when you’re upset. You are that powerful that you are not controlled by your power, you control it. Remember that, Leo.” 

Fitz let out a slow breath, and Hunter chanced a look around them, the dome losing the flames. 

“Good, that’s really good, love. I’m so proud of you.” 

“I did it?” Fitz asked. 

“Yeah, love, you did it. Can I kiss you?” 

Fitz nodded quickly, and Hunter leaned in, sliding his hands around to the back of Fitz’s neck, memorizing how hot his skin felt underneath his touch. Even his lips were hotter as Hunter kissed him slow and sweet. 

“Pull something else back in, whatever is easier. Just find its root and pull it back in.” 

He kept his eyes on Fitz’s, curling his fingers into the hair at the nape of his neck. 

“Remember the first time I kissed you,” he said, determined to keep talking. He could hear sirens off in the distance and prayed that they weren’t coming for him, for Fitz. He couldn’t rush this, or Fitz would panic more. “Underneath the stars in the courtyard of the compound, everyone right around the corner while I slid my hands up under your shirt and you were trying not to make all these adorable little noises that I love. That night, you holding onto me, I’m pretty sure that’s when I started to fall in love with you.” 

“It was,” Fitz answered but didn’t expand. 

Hunter looked around and the dome of protective power was thinner, and he could see Simmons step through it. 

“We’ve got to go,” she called, voice reedy. 

Hunter didn’t have to be an empath to feel Fitz tense up again. 

“Hey, look at me,” Hunter said, leaning in to kiss the corner of Fitz’s mouth. “Don’t focus on her. On anything. Just me. Right here. Being amazing.” 

Fitz let out a small laugh. 

“I love you,” Hunter muttered into Fitz’s cheek, mouth flush against Fitz’s hot skin. He needed his temperature to go down or Fitz was going to burn himself out. He had to calm Fitz down, so he couldn’t worry him about that. “You know that? I love you. I love you so much. You’re so good, and bright. You make me want to be better, to try harder. I would have ditched out of this organization so fast if I hadn’t met you. You are brilliant, and loving, and I love you so much.” 

“I know,” Fitz said, and Hunter grinned at him. 

Hunter felt the power around them die, and the world go quiet just for a moment except Fitz’s anxious breaths against Hunter’s skin. And then, the sirens were getting louder. 

“We have to go,” Hunter said. “Can you stand?” 

Fitz nodded, and they rose, Fitz wobbling but managing. 

“Good, let’s get you back and get you cooled down, love.” 

“I do feel a little hot.” 

“Oh, you’re always hot,” Hunter said, lifting Fitz’s arm up over his shoulder just to keep him close. Fitz could probably walk on his own, but this was more for Hunter’s sake. He wanted Fitz there, close, just in case. 

“Please don’t flirt when we’re running for our lives,” Simmons said, heading towards the exit of the park just ahead of them. 

“Can’t help myself. Almost dying is a turn-on,” Hunter said lightly, seeing Daisy and Ward come around the corner at a run. “See, and now the back-up has arrived. No need to stress.” 

“Who’s stressed?” Fitz joked, his voice a little thin but there was that beautiful wit and sarcasm. “I’m having the time of my life.” 

“You’re around Hunter too much,” Simmons said, flagging down her girlfriend. 

“What the fuck, Fitz?” Ward asked, pulling up beside Hunter and Fitz as if he were going to take Fitz from Hunter. He didn’t mind Ward, but there was no way in hell that Hunter was letting Fitz go until they were safely on the plane, maybe not even then. Maybe not ever again. 

“I didn't do it on purpose,” Fitz grumbled. 

“Yeah, no shit,” Ward started. 

“Lay off, Ward,” Hunter growled before he could continue. Ward rolled his eyes but didn't say anything else. He kept Fitz tucked into his side, both to protect him and keep them at pace with the rest of the group. “You’re doing great, love.” 

“I feel like a bin fire.” 

“You’re a very cute bin fire, though.” 

Fitz laughed, small and breathy, but it kept Hunter going. 

“Hey, where are your shoes?” Fitz asked. 

“That’s a long story. I’ll tell you when we’re safe.”

“Here’s the van,” Daisy said, pulling open the side door and ushering Fitz and Hunter in after Simmons. Daisy and Ward took the front seats, and Hunter looked around at the van. 

“Where’s Bobbi?” 

“Coulson had her try to head off any calls to the Administration at the local police station,” Daisy replied. “She’s okay.” 

“She’s okay,” he repeated, looking down at Fitz tucked into his side looking like he’d been run through the wash and then a taffy puller, pale and stretched out, exhaustion etched into his eyes. Even if she was in trouble, he couldn’t go after her. He couldn’t leave Fitz, not like this, fragile and on the edge of volatile. Fitz would understand, but Hunter couldn’t forgive himself. 

Could he forgive himself for choosing Fitz over Bobbi, though? 

“Hunter,” Fitz mumbled, and Hunter dragged himself back to Fitz. 

“Yeah, love?” 

“She’s okay,” Fitz said. “But if she wasn’t –” 

“I’m not leaving you,” Hunter said, cutting him off. 

“I’m taken care of. You did it. You calmed me down and got me safe. I’m with the team, so if Bobbi needs you, you can leave to help her.” 

“Bob’s okay,” Hunter repeated. 

Fitz smiled, tired at the edges, and kissed where he could reach, the edge of Hunter’s clavicle being his favored spot. 

“That’s not what I’m saying. I know you don’t want to let me out of your sight right now, but if Bobbi needed help, you should go to her and help. She’s our family, and you can choose her over me. I won’t be hurt or offended. I understand.” 

“Leo,” Hunter sighed. 

“Don’t argue with me, Lance,” Fitz replied. “You know I’m right; you just hate it when I’m right and want to be difficult.” 

“I don’t want to leave you.” 

“I don’t want you to leave.” 

Hunter kissed the top of Fitz’s head, and left his mouth against Fitz’s skin, breathing him in, and they stayed there. 

“We just got word from May at the airfield, Bobbi is on her way,” Daisy said, turning in her seat to meet Hunter’s gaze. He could see his own relief echoed in her eyes, and he smiled at her. She caught Simmons’ gaze with her next words. “She’s on her way back to us.” 

Everyone was safe, Hunter had Fitz safe and calm in his arms, and even though he was aching, he was alive. That’s all he needed. 

* * *

Back at the base, Fitz couldn’t help but be quiet as they filed into the med bay for Simmons to look them over. He felt shaken. Nothing like that had ever happened to him. Even playing lab rat in the institution hadn’t - it hadn’t felt like that. He didn’t even want to think about the new things he’d remembered, but even with those, he’d never been cranked up to eleven beyond his own control and left to destroy something. They’d turned him into a weapon. He had always viewed himself as a tool, sure, something people were going to use for their own gains, use his abilities for their own agenda, but at least up until then, he had given himself to those causes. He’d joined SHIELD willingly. He’d joined this team willingly. He had never been forced, been drugged, been left in the open to explode. 

Hunter took his hand, and didn’t let go the entire ride from the park to the base, let him rest against him, let him regain his control and composure. 

Fitz wondered if Hunter had been scared of him at that park, Fitz’s powers bright and hot and suffocating, out of his control. 

But Hunter hadn’t acted scared. Maybe he was really good at hiding it. He was a soldier after all, whereas Fitz was a scientist put out in the field. They weren’t quite the same. 

“Hunter, up on the exam table, please,” Simmons said, drawing Fitz back into the present. “Shirt off.” 

“I’m okay,” Hunter started but Fitz nudged him forward. 

“You were taken hostage by Hydra agents, and beaten, you’re getting a check-up,” Fitz said. Hunter sighed, pulling himself up onto the table, clearly unable to argue with Fitz about this. “Shirt off, she said.” 

Hunter rolled his eyes, and Fitz could see the comment he wanted to make about Fitz trying to get him naked all the time fizzling without coming to life. Fitz watched from nearby as Hunter pulled the shirt up over his head. 

“Jesus,” Fitz hissed, hand coming out to touch Hunter’s chest. There were heavy, blossoming bruises from across his stomach and sides, scrapes littering his arms and back, intentional cuts into his pecs and ribs. There was a deep cut into Hunter’s cheek that Fitz had barely noticed earlier, his own body rebelling against him and distracting him from other concerns. “I will absolutely kill them.” 

“It’s okay,” Hunter said. “I’ve had worse, love.” 

“Fitz, I’ll let you stay in the med bay if you promise to behave. But if you can’t, you will have to leave. I need to look after Hunter.” 

Fitz made an unintentional noise but stepped away. 

“Not too far, love,” Hunter said. 

“Okay, I’m going to have to stitch up your face, that’s a pretty nasty cut.” 

Fitz couldn’t look away, but also watched in horror as Simmons stitched Hunter’s cheek first, cleaned and bandaged his smaller cuts, and then checked for broken ribs. 

“Unfortunately, it does seem like you have a couple fractured ribs, but I can’t set those so it seems the rest is just going to be a long healing process,” Simmons said apologetically. 

“That’s okay, love,” Hunter said. “I’ve had my fair share of brawls, this is nothing. Thank you for your help.” 

“If you have trouble sleeping, let me know.” 

“Will do.” 

He hopped down from the exam and gestured Fitz forward. Fitz couldn’t help himself from running his fingertips barely there over his bruised chest. 

“See, I told you I’m okay,” Hunter said. 

“You look like you were run over by a car,” Fitz replied. 

“A really hot car, though.” 

Fitz couldn’t help his laugh, glad that Hunter at least had his ego in tact. 

“Alright, you’re next, Fitz,” Simmons said. “Talk to me about what happened when you disobeyed orders and got yourself kidnapped.” 

Fitz sighed heavily and knew they’d have a long discussion later about this. 

“Well, I was looking for Hunter, and this doctor I knew from the institution stepped out and I couldn’t do anything. He had a woman, Gwen, a Manifested who worked for him who could make me do whatever he commanded. So, I couldn’t fight back. They took me to this operating room and, I don’t really remember much else. It hurt, though, whatever they did. I don’t think they sedated me, but I must have blacked out. When I came to, I was in the back of a van with that same doctor and a couple of the guards we saw. He injected me with something, told me I was going to be magnificent, and then they let me go into the park.” 

“It was like a shot of adrenaline for your powers,” Simmons said. “Instead of inhibiting them, it dialed them up to an eleven, out of your control.” 

“What were they looking to do, though?” Hunter asked. 

“Have the Administration called and have you legally locked away, I suspect. You were legally acquired through SHIELD on the basis that you’d be trained to control your abilities. If that’s not the case, the Administration has the power to return you to their care.” 

“That’s partially it, I think, but I also think they wanted a demonstration of what they’d created. If they can amp up their Manifested lap dogs’ powers, they’d be formidable. They could have their own army.” 

A shudder ran through Fitz, and Hunter reached out to touch his shoulder, grounding him. Fitz smiled, glad to have Hunter back at his side, safe and sound in this home they’d found. 

“Can I ask, though, when you might have bonded with Hunter?” Simmons asked. 

Fitz looked up, eyebrows furrowing. 

“What?” 

“You didn’t notice that Hunter could walk through your shell when even I couldn’t?” 

Fitz barely remembered anything after the van, his skin burning hot, each power inside of him roiling, his body alight with pain he couldn’t describe. 

Not until Hunter, who had drawn him back to humanity, holding onto him and talking. He loved Hunter’s voice, was drawn to it when the world was explosive, loud, uncontrollable and overwhelming. 

“You did?” 

He turned to face Hunter who shrugged. 

“I did. I don’t know how, or when, but we bonded –” 

“That afternoon at the Plaza,” Fitz answered before Hunter could finish. 

“Oh,” Hunter said, and Fitz could tell he was remembering too. “ _ Oh _ .” 

“Yeah.” 

“What happened?” Simmons asked. 

Fitz and Simmons didn’t really talk about their sex lives. Mostly because Fitz hadn’t ever had one before, not really, and Simmons was content to keep that part of her life private from him. Which was fine. He didn’t need to think of that. 

“We had a lovely afternoon,” Hunter said, which was extremely tame for Hunter who had no shame about telling everyone exactly what his sex life entailed. 

“Uh-huh,” Simmons said. “It wasn’t a conscious effort to bond, then. Not the way SHIELD had us do?” 

“Not at all,” Fitz said. He’d thought he’d felt something snap into place between them, a tether, maybe, but he’d chalked it up to the heat of the moment. “Completely accidental.” 

“I wonder how many Manifested have gone through something similar, have multiple Handlers, or Handlers who have multiple Manifested charges.” 

Fitz shrugged. He was quite exhausted and while it was fascinating to find out that he and Hunter had done something previously thought impossible, mostly he just wanted a nap. A good nap after a long shower, tucked against Hunter, the lights low and the blankets piled up around them like a nest. 

“Have you healed already from whatever you went through?” she asked. 

He pulled up his shirt, and sure enough, his stomach and chest were smooth save for his old scars. 

“Looks like it,” he said. 

“Okay, let me know if you feel faint or weird or sick in any way. I just want to take a blood sample to see if we can detect that accelerant, and then you can go rest up.” 

Fitz climbed up on the exam table and held out his arm. Hunter took his free hand. 

“I don’t know about you, but I want a sandwich really bad,” Hunter said conversationally to distract Fitz. He didn’t have a problem with blood or needles, usually, but he was already feeling faint so he didn’t want to risk it. After what he’d learned from his file, he might start having a problem. “Like, a comically big sandwich.” 

“I’d like a shower,” Fitz said. 

His file, which Hunter didn’t know about.

He’d have to tell Hunter.

“Could I join?” Hunter asked, and Fitz rolled his eyes at that. 

“After what you did today, what you went through, how could I say no?” 

“Just make sure to cover those bandages if you’re showering,” Simmons said, coming back with a vial, a tourniquet, and a needle. 

“You’re a killjoy sometimes, Simmons,” Hunter said. 

“You know what’s a killjoy? Infection.” 

“That’s true. Antibiotics can have side effects on your sex drive and ability to hold an erection,” Fitz said. 

“That’s not true!” Hunter protested. 

“It’s not, but that would suck.” 

Fitz shifted to look at Hunter better as Simmons wrapped the tourniquet around his bicep and flicked at his vein a little. 

“A big sandwich sounds good, though. Sandwich, shower, bed?” 

“You’re supposed to go to debriefing after this,” Simmons said, taking Fitz's arm in her hand to steady it. 

“Debriefing, sandwich, shower, bed,” Fitz amended. 

“Don’t we also have that meeting with the Director to assess the Hydra situation and whether we should take precautions against them?” Hunter asked. 

“Fuck, this list is getting longer and longer. I just want to sleep.” 

“Debriefing, Director, sandwich, shower, sleep,” Hunter said. 

The needle pricked into Fitz's skin and he froze in Simmons' grasp until Hunter squeezed his other hand to solidify him. 

“Oh, what if they decide to disband us?” Fitz asked. 

“Why would they do that?” 

“Hydra now has Manifested accelerant it can use at any point. What if they decide a team of Manifested is not a good idea to put out in the field together?” 

“We’re a good team, and it was one incident.” 

“I almost leveled that park today,” Fitz argued. “I wasn’t in control, I was scared, and I could have hurt all of those innocent people just having a nice lunch.” 

“That is not your fault.” 

“But what if, Hunter? What if they send us back to the lab, and you go out in the field with Bobbi, and I don’t get to see you ever?” 

Hunter glanced at Simmons but Fitz couldn’t take his eyes off of him. If they were going to be disbanded, he wanted to look at Hunter for as long as he could, to memorize every line and curve of his face, the sparkle in his eyes, the way his emotions felt like a blanket rather than a noose. 

“Love,” he said, slow and measured. “Even if they disband us, I’m not letting you go. You’re stuck with me, okay, as long as you’ll have me.” 

Fitz reached up and stroked over Hunter’s jaw, gently to not disturb the bruise beneath, feeling the bristle of his stubble beneath his thumb pad. 

“I don’t want to ask you to choose between me and your life with Bobbi, you know? Here, you can have both so easily, but if I get sent back into the lab, then –” 

Hunter brought his own hand up to touch Fitz's mouth, a sign to slow, to listen instead. 

“I don’t love the life I had before this team. I don’t love the field or being an agent. What I love is you, Fitz, so if you get sent back to the lab, then I will follow you there.” 

They didn’t usually have an audience when Hunter promised him the future, something they saved for quiet corners and beneath bed covers. Simmons made a noise like awe, and hurried away with her sample to test. 

“Are you sure?” 

“I have been in the field since I was a kid, jumping from army to mercenary to SHIELD, and it’s not, it’s what I’m good at, but it’s not anything I would choose for myself again. I would do anything or be anything if it meant I got to come home to you. And as far as Bobbi, I love her, but I don’t want to build a life with her. I want her in my life because she’s my best friend, but I don’t love her like this, like forever. You know that, right? You know that you are it for me now. I found you, and like I said, if you’ll have me, I’ll be here for the rest of my life.” 

“Hunter,” Fitz muttered. “Are you sure? That’s asking a lot of you, a lot for you to give up and change, for me.” 

“I’d give up the entire world.” 

“I can’t ask that of you.” 

“You’re not. I’m offering it.” 

Fitz rested his forehead against Hunter’s and breathed out. 

“I’m not good enough for you, you know.” 

“Well, I’m not good enough for you, so we’re even there.” 

“Hunter, Fitz, Simmons, you’re needed in the conference room for a debrief,” May said as she ducked into the lab for a second. “If you’re finished with your snuggle session.” 

“Not yet, but we’ll see you there,” Hunter replied. 

“You alright, Fitz?” May asked. 

“I’m good. Thanks, May.” 

“Debrief in five, then.” 

Fitz slid his hands down Hunter’s chest to his hips and kissed the tip of his nose. 

“I want you for the rest of my life, too. Even though you deserve someone so much better than me, even though I’ll get you hurt, I want you there with me.” 

“If you’re going to propose to one another, please just do it,” Simmons said from where she was preparing the sample of Fitz’s blood for analysis. “I love you both but this is entirely too sweet for even me.” 

“Simmons,” Fitz scolded. 

“What?” 

“I mean, I’m not opposed to marrying you right here,” Hunter said. Fitz covered his mouth and looked at Simmons ready to argue, then stalled and looked back at Hunter. 

“Really?” 

“You’re not getting married in my lab,” Simmons said. “Plus your mum would never forgive you.” 

“Really,” Hunter replied. 

“We can’t, right?” 

“I mean, unless you want to?” 

“No, you don’t want to. Stop it,” Simmons said. She pushed at Fitz’s shoulder to break the moment. “Discuss this later. Debrief, Director, sandwich, shower, sleep. Go.” 

“You’ll be my best man, you know,” Fitz said, winking at her. “Or whatever the equivalent is because you’re a woman.” 

“Of course, I would be, don’t be silly.” 

He grinned, and caught Hunter’s hand. 

“Come on, love. The faster we get through the day, the sooner we can get married in secret without Jemma knowing,” he said, heading towards the door. 

“That’s not what I meant, either!” Simmons protested. 

“Debriefing, Simmons! Five minutes!” 

* * *

“Fitz,” May said, sinking into the chair across from him. 

“Don’t ask if I’m okay.”

“I’m going to.”

He sighed.

“Are you okay?”

“I’m alive, I’m in one piece, I didn’t leave a spleen or a kidney on an operating room floor. But,” he said and paused, “I don’t know how okay I am.”

“Do you want to be pulled from the field?”

“I don’t know.”

“Do you think it would be best if you were pulled from the field, then?”

“Yeah, absolutely. If I hadn’t froze, Hunter wouldn’t have been captured, and I wouldn’t have been captured, and – yes, I think it would be for the best. But I would like to reiterate, this shouldn’t affect Simmons. I know this is a Manifested-Handler team, but she shouldn’t be constrained to the lab or pulled from the field because I fucked up.”

“We won’t  pull Simmons ,” she replied. 

“Good.”

Coulson stepped in with a small smile.

“Sorry I’m late, Daisy was showing me the files you found, Fitz.”

“Which ones?”

“Yours.”

He nodded.

“And?” Fitz asked. “What do you think?”

“I think you’re incredibly strong for being as well adjusted as you are, if I’m being honest.”

That made Fitz laugh, which felt wrong given everything, but also like he had come home after an exceedingly long day and his family was there to catch him. Which he had. That was exactly what had happened. He had come home, and this team was his family, and they were here when he needed them.

“I will do everything I can to help you bring down Hydra Tech,” Fitz said decisively. “I want them gone from the world, delegitimized and left bare. I don’t want to be in the field for a while, but between Daisy and I, there’s no where they can go.”

May smiled at him and said, “that’s my boy.”

* * *

After the conference call with the director, and a comically large sandwich, and an extremely long shower together, Hunter gathered Fitz in his arms and lay down in bed. 

“Okay,” Hunter said. “Do you want to talk about today, or do you want to cuddle and forget about it?”

“Yeah,” Fitz said a little sleepily. 

“What?”

“Talk about it. There’s some stuff I have to tell you.”

“It can wait, if you want,” Hunter said.

“I want,” Fitz said, but his voice was quiet. “Give me a second.”

“In the morning?”

“No, no, I can do it.”

“Okay.”

Fitz shifted so he was resting his cheek against Hunter’s chest, and Hunter ran his hands through Fitz’s hair.

“Okay, so, we found a file,” Fitz said. “My file, from the institution.”

Hunter stroked fingers down Fitz’s neck. 

“What’d you find?”

“I buried a lot of stuff, and – I'm sorry.”

“Do you want to stop?”

“I’m not, it’s not that. I’m sorry for happened to you. If I hadn’t gone digging, I wouldn’t have had –”

“I’m sorry, what?” 

“I know, I should have said something earlier. I’m so sorry for what happened to you, baby.” 

“I don’t need you to apologize,” Hunter said, sitting up and shifting Fitz with him. “Why would I need you to apologize? You did nothing wrong.”

“You got hurt.”

“So did you.”

“I healed, though. You’re covered in bruises, and cuts. You have fractured ribs. All the evidence of what happened today is  _ all over you _ .”

“Just because you heal faster than I do doesn’t mean you’re not  _ hurt  _ too, Fitz. I heard about the file, and what you found out. I don’t know what they did to you when they separated us, but you were screaming when I found you in the park. You are allowed to be hurt, and you don’t have to be okay right now.” 

“If I am okay,” Fitz started, “is that okay?”

“Yeah. Of course. But, do you know it’s okay if you want to fall apart with me? It is. I know you want to seem tough and like you’re able to hold it all together, but if you want, you can absolutely fall apart with me. I’m here to catch all the pieces, and hold onto them until you’re ready to put them back together, and I can help you put them back right. I promised you the world, right, the future, and I will give that to you. I just, you trust me, right?”

“Of course, I do.”

“Okay.  Then, do you trust me to pick everything up and hold onto you when you need it?”

“Yeah. I do.”

Hunter looked  him over carefully.

“Tell me about what happened.”

Fitz  looked at him back, and then started. 

“ My dad sold me to the  institution for  money. There’s a literal price on my life in that file. He sold me to Hydra Tech to be a lab rats,  and  it turns out  they  didn’t just test  inhibitors on me. ”

Hunter  listened, and  held Fitz when he needed, and let him cry on his shoulder when he couldn’t continue. The things that had been done to Fitz had always bordered on inhumane, but  now, they boiled Hunter’s blood. 

The next time he saw that doctor or those guards again, he wouldn’t just knee them in the stomach.

His revenge  didn’t matter as much as Fitz’s safety. They’d proved that as long as Hydra Tech existed,  Fitz wasn’t safe from them. He’d do anything to make Fitz safe.

And if he ever saw  Alistair Fitz, he would make sure  that no one  else ever did.

* * *

“What’s next?” Daisy asked, her feet in Fitz’s lap. They’d abandoned the pretense of working a few hours ago and had been gossiping and talking about their individual traumas. It was an extensive list, and Fitz was glad he had Daisy  as a friend. They’d even gotten snacks and drinks and snuck them into the lab. “Bringing the boo home to mom, or?”

“Yeah, we have a holiday coming up soon, so I was thinking of asking him to come with  me.”

“That’s really sweet. And he’s been good to you?”

“Almost too good.”

“Good. I’d  quake him to pieces if he wasn’t.”

He laughed and she smiled brightly at him.

“How are things with you and the girlfriends?”

“Oh, god,  _ so good _ . I didn’t think I’d ever  find someone like them, either one of them. I didn’t think I deserved it.  They’re wonderful, and smart, and impressive. They’re so good, and  I think I love them. I don’t know what to do with that. I was alone for so long and I  don’t think I actually know how to be loved, but with them, I want to try.”

Fitz nodded.

“I know how that feels,” he said. “I still don’t believe I get to go to bed and wake up next to Hunter every day. That doesn’t seem real.”

“Plus, there’s you,” she said. “Didn’t think I’d ever have a brother.”

He smiled and replied, “ yeah , who knew we’d find family here? ”

“I had hoped, but I hadn’t – I’m so glad  we met, Fitz. I wouldn’t have made it through my parents going dark or  my flares without you. ”

“God, I know, right?”

She rested her head on his shoulder as best she could. 

“Are you worried?” she asked.

“About? I mean, generally, yes, but about?”

“I don’t know, the whole thing. Hydra Tech. The doctor. Aubrey.”

“No. Maybe. I trust everyone to keep me safe, and each other safe. And I trust that we’ll save Aubrey, and get her the help she needs, the way that SHIELD helped me. And the doctor will get what’s coming to him. Hunter will see to that.”

He pushed a piece of her hair back behind her  ear and looked at  her carefully.

“Hydra Tech, well, I suspect their name will always be literal. Hydra Tech won’t ever really go away, but I want to a be a large part of their decline and downfall when it comes.”

“I love you, you know,” she said softly. 

“You know what, I love you, too.” He kissed her forehead. “No matter what terrible things happened to me, I know I’ve got something amazing to come home to. Between you, Jemma, and Hunter, not to mention Coulson and May, I don’t have to worry about being caught when I fall.”

* * *

“Hey, guess what,” Fitz said, sitting down between Hunter and Mack on the couch. “I just got my official power level rating.”

“Weren’t you already assessed?” Bobbi asked.

“Yeah. But with my last Manifest and that incident in the park, they reassessed me and have since been adjusted. I’m now one of three level twelves in the entire SHIELD system.”

* * *

“Can you believe that a year ago, we were in the lab, single and lonely?” Jemma asked one night, nondescript, like any other night before them. They were cleaning up the lab. Bobbi had left for a workout with May and Yo-Yo, her station cleaned, and Daisy had a phone call with her parents that she’d ducked out for. It was just the two of them in their lab, just like it had always been. “Can you believe that you’ve been with Hunter for almost a year? So much has changed.”

“Yeah,” he said. “It’s weird to think there was a time that we weren’t here.”

“Exactly! Oh gosh, I can’t believe we used to stay in the lab exclusively.”

“Speak for yourself.”

“Well, you went out into the field. It’s just, you know, safer for you here, but we  _ learned _ that! We learned what you’re capable of!”

He laughed, preparing his tools for the sanitizer. It wasn’t necessary, but he liked knowing they were clean. 

“I think a lot of people learned what I’m capable of,” he said.

“Well, there’s that too, but you’re more confident than you used to be. I mean, you got yourself a boyfriend, a steady one who you love and have sex with! That’s great! You’ve never had that before. And you’re not afraid of your powers, and you use them openly! I used to have to beg you to train, and now you and Daisy spar with them, and – I'm incredibly proud of you. I’m so proud of you.”

“And what about you!” he replied, setting his tools down on the mat and looking at Jemma seriously. “You have two girlfriends, Jemma! Two! You, who said you were too insecure to be in a relationship with a pretty girl has two gorgeous girlfriends! And you’re a field agent!”

“I am! Look at us go! Aren’t you glad I made us join the team?”

“I am,” he replied. “I really am, Jem. All of this, all of me, everything is thanks to you. You saved me, and you continue to save me every day. I would have nothing if I didn’t have you.”

She smiled at him and reached out over the lab bench separating them. He took her hand and squeezed. 

“Hey,” Hunter said, swinging into the lab and pausing, “oh. Am I interrupting?”

“Oh, no,” Jemma said, smiling at him. “We were being sentimental, but we’ve got all the time in the world for that, right, Fitz?”

“All the time,” he agreed. “I’m almost done here, Hunter, and then we can go to dinner.”

“Take your time,” Hunter said, leaning against the end of the lab bench. “I’ve always got it to spare for you.”

Once Fitz’s tools were in the sanitizer, he caught Hunter’s hand and called a goodbye to Jemma.

“Ready?” he asked, and Hunter nodded. “Think of a place in the world you want to go, anywhere you want to go.”

Hunter looked puzzled for a moment, but Fitz felt the diner in Los Angeles pass over Hunter’s mind. Then, Fitz concentrated and let his power take them there. When they landed, Hunter gasped, and looked around, mouth open, and Fitz winked. He didn’t feel tired, or achy, or overwhelmed. He felt even, and sure, like he could do anything. 

“Come on, mister, I’ve got the world to show you, and all the time in the world.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 10 months later and I finally finished it! Thanks for sticking in there!!! <3
> 
> -k


End file.
